k 





i UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



BOOPCS 

BY 

J. K. Fradmburgh, Ph. D., D. D. 



WITNESSES FROM THE DUST; or, The 
Bible Illustrated f/om the Monuments. 
Illustrated, i2mo,%i.6o. 

LIVING RELIGIONS; or, The Great Re- 
ligions of the Orient from Sacred Books and 
Modern Customs. 

Illustrated, i2mo, %i .50. 

BE A UTY CRO IVNED ; or. The Story of Esther, 
thefeivish Maiden. 

Illustrated, izmo, go cents. 

OLD HEROES; The Htttites of the Bible. 
l2mo, Cloth, js cents. Paper, 50 cents. 

FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 
Illustrated, i2>'no. 



FIRE FROM STRANGE 
ALTARS. 



REV. J. NfFRADENBURGH, Ph. D., D. D. 

u 

AUTHOR OF "WITNESSES FROM THE DUST ; OR, THE BIBLE ILLUSTRATED 

FROM THE MONUMENTS." "LIVING RELIGIONS; OR, THE GREAT 

RELIGIONS OF THE ORIENT FROM SACRED BOOKS AND MODERN 

CUSTOMS." " BEAUTY CROWNED ; OR, THE STORY OF 

ESTHER, THE JEWISH MAIDEN." " OLD HEROES, 

THE HITTITES OF THE BIBLE," ETC. 




CINCINNATI : 

CRANSTON & STOWE. 

NEW YORK : 

HUNT & EATON. 



\\-.^, 



^v^"^ 

^^A 



Copyright 

By CRANSTON <& STO^A^E, 

1891, 



. . . TO • • • 

REV. DANIEL STEELE, D. D., 

My Early Preceptor, 



BipB j^rljrilarsljip anti 3i^^ f>nlj3 IjaoB bsen fo ntc 
Jin ^napirafion, 

THIS VOLUME IS GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED. 



PREFACE. 



IN obedience to the call of God, Abraham, with 
his family and dependents, had left his own 
kindred, and gone out from his own country to 
seek a home in a strange land. In the Land of 
Promise he became the founder of the Patriarchal 
Religion, which afterward developed into the 
organized religious system of the Israelites. The 
Canaanite was still in the land. Various re- 
ligious cults surrounded " the friend of God." 
They were so closely related that we may speak 
of them as forming one religion, which we may 
call, for want of a more appropriate name, the 
Phoenician. Other cults were added or devel- 
oped at a later period, but did not materially 
change the general character of the religion. 
Besides this setting in which the religion of 
Israel was placed, it was brought into frequent 
and close contact with two other great and 
powerful religions, the Babylonian and the Egyp- 
tian. These religions possessed all the advan- 



8 PREFACE. 

tages of great antiquity, support of strong gov- 
ernments, learned and influential priesthoods, 
extensive literatures, magnificent temples, and 
brilliant services. In the struggle for existence, 
the peculiar people of God would have scarcely 
a chance. 

The religion of the Israelites alone survived. 
The nation suffered from wars and conquests, 
oppressions and captivities, but these only served 
to assist the religion to a more healthful growth 
and a more spiritual worship. The exigencies 
of war and political revolutions do not fully 
account for the decay and final extinction of sur- 
rounding religions. They are not to be forgotten 
in the solution of the problem, but there is a 
point beyond which they are silent. 

These heathen faiths lacked some element of 
moral strength, or suffered from some incurable 
spiritual malady which fixed their doom. The 
religion of Israel lived in obedience to the law 
of the survival of the fittest. It was adapted 
to the intellectual and moral nature of man. 
When we study these several faiths side by side, 
we learn the reasons why the religions of the 
Babylonians, the Phoenicians, and the Egyptians, 



PREFACE. 9 

went down in irremediable ruin, while the re- 
ligion of the Bible flourished, and sent its in- 
fluence abroad till all nations felt its touch. 

The Bible grew up in the midst of such sur- 
roundings and under such influences as the 
histories of these nations suggest. The Israel- 
itish religion was a growth, and was not presented 
once for all in its completed form, lifted up out 
of all connections with other faiths. That many of 
its forms were borrowed and adapted, can admit 
of no question. Can we prove a transmission of 
spiritual ideas ? Was it a mere natural growth, 
or was there a divine element with which we 
must reckon when we study the subject? 

The roots of the Bible religion are to be dis- 
covered deeply imbedded in other soils. Con- 
nections may be traced in the style of poetic 
compositions, the words of many a psalm and 
prayer, and in the general religious feeling. 
Myths of other religions have left survivals in 
the Bible. Names of heathen gods are woven 
in the very constitution of the Hebrew language. 
This is especially noteworthy in the proper names 
of persons and places. Several of the old gods of 
Assyria and Egypt extended their influence as far 



10 PREFACE. 

as Canaan, and found admission in the pantheon of 
native divinities. Magic, both Egyptian and 
Chaldsean, is frequently mentioned in the Bible. 
Altars, temples, sacred furniture, orders of priests, 
sacrifices, laws concerning clean and unclean, pu- 
rificatory rites, — these should be studied, not only 
in the Bible and other Hebrew writings, but also 
in the religious ceremonies of other peoples. 

The most interesting, the most reliable, the 
most authoritative, and the best of all com- 
mentaries on the Holy Bible is extant in three 
goodly volumes, and these volumes are Babylonia, 
Palestine, and Egypt. There are portions of the 
Pentateuch and historic books of the Bible which 
should be read while sitting by the temples and 
palaces, pyramids and tombs of the dead empires 
of the East. 

The ten plagues of the Exodus, in their selection 
and import, yield to no explanation except when 
studied in the presence of the gods of Egypt. 
There are passages in the Prophets which can not 
be understood except when read in the light of 
clay tablets, stone obelisks, arid ancient papyri. 
There are psalms which are to be interpreted by 
the murmuring streams, leafy coverts, and rocky 



PREFACE. 11 

hills of Palestine. These silent witnesses, who 
are rising from beneath the dust of the ages, are 
eloquent advocates in behalf of the Bible as the 
inspired Word. The most important ciiapters 
in this great commentary are those which enable 
us to feel the beatings of the hearts of the peo- 
ple as they reverently approach their gods in 
the attitude of worshipers. 

As we study these old religions in the pres- 
ence of an open Bible, many questions hitherto 
insoluble answer themselves. The subject opens 
to us new and delightful fields, full of interest 
and abundant in rewards. The present volume 
will not, we are sure, prove itself an unwelcome 
contribution to the subject. 

Decembek 25, 1890. 



CONTENTS. 



RELIGION IN THE LAND BETWEEN THE RIVERS. 

Page. 
I. Literature, Priests, and Temples, . . 17 
IL The Black Art, 41 

III. Transitions and Transformations, . . 67 

IV. Gods and No-Gods. Part First, . . 95 
V. Gods and No-Gods. Part Second, . . 121 

VI. The Beginnings of Things, . . . 146 

II 

THE GODS OF THE PHCENICIANS 

I. My Lord Baal, 169 

II. Gods, and Other Matters, . . . 186 

III. 

THE FAITH OF THE PHARAOHS. 

I. Language and Literature, . , .211 

II. Two Great Circles of Gods, . . . 241 

III. Ptah, Amon, and Other Divinities, . . 261 

IV. Doctrines, Temples, Worship, . . 282 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Babylonian Tablets, 

Clay Tablet, .... 

Ruins of the Temple at Khorsabad, 

Assyrian Figure, 

Chald.ean Priests, .... 

Evil Geno, 

Winged Lion with Human Head, . 
The Tree of Life, 
Ur of the Chaldees, 
NiSROCH of Assur, 
Sarcophagus of Esmunazar, . 
Phcenician Gem, .... 
Face of Baal at Baalbec, 
Astarte, ..... 
Effigy of Baal, .... 
The Phoenician Ashtoreth, . 
Ruins of Ancient Tyre, 

Dagon, 

Amon, 

Obelisk and Plain of On, . 
Signet Ring, with Scarab^us, 
Osiris, 

ISIS AND NePHTHIS, .... 

Apis, 

Rock Tombs on the Nile, 
Columns at Karnak, 



Page. 

19 

22 

29 

35 

39 

42 

69 

82 

104 

142 

170 

172 

173 

175 

176 

179 

182 

187 

195 

242 

243 

249 

252 

290 

296 

303 



BBligion in fIjB lanti IJBftti?:en fIjB 
HiDBr0. 



I. 

LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 

THE discovery of a literature from twenty- 
five hundred to four thousand years old, 
which had been buried more than two thousand 
years in the ruins of the dead cities of Babylonia 
and Assyria, the recovery of the lost languages 
in which it is written, and their translation into 
modern tongues, are among the remarkable tri- 
umphs of nineteenth-century scholarship. The 
geographical position of these mighty empires, 
the richness of their soil, the size and magnifi- 
cence of their great cities, the wideness of their 
sway in the days of their glory, the influence 
they exerted on early Eastern thought, and in 
molding and modifying religions and mytholo- 
gies, the place they fill in Oriental history, and 
their intimate relations with the chosen people 
of God, — these considerations lend importance to 
any new discoveries which may be made con- 
cerning their early history, and the thoughts 
which moved the hearts of their peoples. 

Here was the home of Abraham, " the friend 
of God," and, in the light of recent Assyrian 
discoveries, we may now believe that he carried 



18 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

with him, in his migration to Canaan, the con- 
tents of the sacred books of the kingdom of Ur, 
embracing the earliest traditions of the Creation, 
the Flood, and other facts recorded by his great 
descendant under the pjuidance of the Spirit of 
God in the Book of Genesis. 

By public and private liberality and enter- 
prise, the literary treasures of these ancient na- 
tions have had a glorious resurrection, and the 
modern scholar has breathed into them the breath 
of life, and they now speak to us and reveal 
wonderful secrets concerning the political, social, 
and religious history of many peoples. The lan- 
guage in which this history is written, with its 
difficult syllabary and strange cuneiform charac- 
ters, is being slowly yet surely and thoroughly 
deciphered and interpreted, and already we have 
grammars, dictionaries, texts, reading-books, com- 
mentaries, translations, professorships, classes, and 
societies devoted to the work of presenting to our 
own generation the records which have been re- 
covered from the tombs of these cemeteries of 
dead empires. The future can be only more 
glorious in revelations from this interesting 
field. 

The Assyrians used a mode of writing bor- 
rowed from the Accadians, who spoke a Tura- 
nian tongue. To adapt a hieroglyphic, idiographic. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 



19 



and syllabic alphabet to a Semitic language, 
was found to be most difficult. "The Turanian 
cuneiform writing, as science has now proved, 
was originally hieroglyphic — that is, composed of 
pictures of material objects — and these forms can 
in some cases be reconstructed. An inscription 
entirely written in these hieroglyphics exists at 





lJPr|(tr^:ipn^ 



Babylonian Tablets, containing Cuneiform Inscriptions. 

Siisa, as is positively known ; but it has not yet 
been copied, and is therefore unfortunately not 
available for study. 

" In the course of time, by a very natural pro- 
cess, the pictured representation underwent a 
transformation in common use, in exact accordance 
with the process by which the Egyptian hieratic 



20 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

was formed from the hieroglyphic, and the present 
Chinese characters from the pictures originally 
used. The desire for simplicity contributed to 
replace the picture by some few lines, which, 
without exactly copying its form, might serve to 
recall at any rate its most peculiar characteristic. 
The most ancient monumental remains of Baby- 
lonia and Chaldaea are inscribed with this form 
of writing, previous to its having assumed the 
cuneiform character, and this is called by scholars 
hieratic." * 

The Accadians, who came from Elam at a very 
early period, were conquered by the Semites, 
perhaps as early as B. C. 3750, and many hun- 
dreds of years later their language ceased to be 
spoken, but long maintained its position as the 
language of learning and religion. The victori- 
ous Semites seem to have been called Casdim in 
the Old Testament, Assyrian casidi, " conquerors." 
Their earliest recovered monuments are clay tab- 
lets covered with brief but invaluable records. 
The Accadians bequeathed to the Casdim, not 
only their mode of writing, but also many of their 
laws, arts, sciences, and much of their religion. 
The Semites spoke a language closely allied 
to the Assyrian, and their religion resembled 

■■ Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. I, pp. 
433, 434. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 21 

that of the authors of the Himyaritic inscrip- 
tions. 

The Assyrian language is nearest akin to the 
Hebrew, and to the Phoenician, which differs dia- 
lectically but slightly from the Hebrew. This 
fact has already enabled Semitic scholars to 
settle important questions of etymology and 
grammar, and thus to advance the interests of 
sound Biblical criticism. Assyrian differs widely 
from Aramaic, though sharing with it a number 
of important peculiarities. It differs widely also 
from the members of the Southern group of 
Semitic languages — the Arabic, Himyaritic, and 
Bthiopic* 

The archaic literature of Babylonia and As- 
syria has been preserved on clay tablets. While 
impressible, they were stamped with the arrow- 
head characters, and then baked. Sometimes 
they were covered with a clay coating, and then 
baked a second time. In the latter case, upon 
the removal of the outer coating, a double im- 
pression of the writing is revealed. 

The tablets are of all sizes, "from an inch 
long to over a foot square." They are most fre- 
quently in a fragmentary condition when found, 
and the task of restoration is very great. They 
were arranged according to subjects in the 

* Sayce, Assyrian Lectures. Ninth Lecture. 



22 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



libraries, their titles were stamped on the backs 
of the tablets, and catalogues carefully prepared 
were ever at hand for convenient reference. 
The royal library of Nineveh and the great 
library of Sippara contained many thousands of 
volumes or tablets. 

The first library of Chaldsea, according to 
Berosus, was established in the antediluvian Pan- 
tibiblia, the capital under Amelon, the third 
fabulous king. Xisuthrus, 
the Chaldaean Noah, by com- 
mand of Cronos, buried his 
books at Sippara to be re- 
covered after the Deluge. 
The library of Erech, to 
which belonged the wonder- 
ful epic of Gizdhubar, con- 
taining the story of the 
Flood, was among the most ancient of which we 
possess reliable information. The library of Cutha 
has furnished a legend of the creation and the war 
of the giants, while that of Larsa or Senkereh has 
yielded a number of mathematical tablets. 

Sargon I, " the genuine rightful king," who 
bore the title " king of justice," with which we 
may compare Melchizedek, " king of righteous- 
ness," was a noble patron of learning before 
B. C. 3750. He conquered the whole of Baby- 




Clay Tablet. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 23 

Ionia, and established the capital at Agane. 
Here he founded a great library celebrated for 
its works on astronomy and astrology, one of 
which consisted of no less than seventy-two 
books. Berosus seems to have translated this 
work into Greek. There was another important 
library at Calah. But the royal library of Nin- 
eveh, belonging to King Assurbanipal, which has 
yielded so many treasures to the British Mu- 
seum, was the most celebrated. Assurbanipal 
encouraged the study of the dead Sumerian and 
Accadian languages, and caused grammars and 
dictionaries to be compiled, and translations to 
be made. 

It has been remarked that the Assyrians an- 
ticipated the Hamiltonian method of teaching 
languages by many centuries. Copies of the 
most important works belonging to the old library 
of Agane were made and distributed among the 
libraries of Assyria, while during the same period 
of literary activity, many new works were pro- 
duced. 

This great library was most thoroughly or- 
ganized, and must have had an extensive pat- 
ronage. We have recovered even some of the 
rules of the efficient librarian concerning the use 
of the books. Chiefly through the labors of the 
greatly lamented George Smith, the tablets from 



24 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the palace of Nineveh were unpacked, examined, 
ticketed, and pieced together. " Historical and 
mythological documents, religious records, legal, 
geographical, astronomical, and astrological trea- 
tises ; poetical compositions, grammatical and lex- 
ical disquisitions, lists of stones and trees, of 
birds and beasts, copies of treaties, of commercial 
transactions, of correspondence, of petitions to 
the king, and of royal proclamations, — such were 
the chief contents of this strange old library. 
The larger portion of the religious and poetical 
works were translations from Accadian, the orig- 
inal text being generally given side by side with 
the Asssyrian rendering." * 

The library at Babylon may have been founded 
by Khammuragas, the first of the Cosssean kings, 
who overthrew the Sargon dynasty. Sennacherib 
carried the largest portion of its contents to 
Assyria, when he took the city in B. C. 695. 

Assyriologists, who have waited with great 
interest the progress of literary discoveries in 
Babylonia, the home of early 'art, science, and 
religion, have not been disappointed. Hormuzd 
Rassam, in his expedition of 1880-81, recovered 
important records from the ruins of the temples 
and palaces of Babylon, Borsippa, Sippara, and 
Cutha. The records found in Jumjuma in 1874, 

* Sayce, Babylonian Literature, p. 16. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 25 

prove this mound to be the site of the great 
commercial exchange of Babylon. 

One of the earliest accounts of the discov- 
eries of Mr. Rassam, says : " These tablets show 
that for a long period, probably several centuries, 
the family of the Beni Egibi were the leading 
commercial firm of Babylon, and to them was 
confided all the business of the Babylonian Min- 
istry of Finance. The building, whose ruins are 
marked by the mound of Jumjunia, was the chan- 
ceUerie of the firm, and from its ruins come the 
records of every class of monetary transactions. 
The documents being all most carefully dated 
and compiled, are of great value to the chronol- 
ogist and historian, while to the student of Baby- 
lonian civilization they are of the highest im- 
portance. From the tax receipts we learn how 
the revenue was raised by duties levied on land, 
on crops of dates and corn, on cattle, by imports 
for the use of the irrigation canals, and the use 
of the public roads. The insight into the com- 
ponent elements of social life, ranging from the 
kings and princes, the priests and soldiers, down 
to the lowest peasant and slave, is such as is 
hardly afforded by the records of any other na- 
tion. By the aid of these records, we can almost 
picture the motley. crowds of citizens and coun- 
trymen who gathered in the court-yard of the 



26 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

great Babylonian bankers. Then, as now, in the 
same land, the tax-gatherer was an extortionist; 
and many a petition was lodged against his 
claims." * 

It is possible that we may yet be compelled 
to remand this banking firm of Egibi & Co. to 
the realm of myths ; but, however this may be, 
great commercial activity is certainly shown by 
the multitude of documents which have been 
brought to light by Mr. Rassam. 

A great triumph of Mr. Rassam in his last 
expedition, was the identification of the mounds 
Abu Hubba with the antediluvian Sippara, and 
the proof that the priests of this ancient city 
were worshipers of the solar disk nnd solar rays, 
and had a creed resembling that of the disk- 
worshipers of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty. 
There was a second city of Sippara and the two 
cities may be identified with the cities of Sephar- 
vaim mentioned in the Bible.f 

Mr. Rassam gives the following account of his 
discoveries in an ancient building: "We first of 
all discovered four rooms, and then we came upon 



■The London Times, August 27, 1881. Egibi, the founder 
of the firm, is thought to have Uved during the reign of Sen- 
nacherib. Boscawen, Transactions of the Society of Biblical 
Archaeology. Vol. YI, p. 9. 

t2 Kings xvii, 24, 31; xviii, 34; xix, 13; Isa. xxxvi, 19; 
xxxvii, 13. 



LITERATURE, PRTESTS, AND TEMPLES. 27 

a fifth. The first four rooms were paved in 
what I should call the Assyrian or Babylonian 
style; /. e., with bricks or stone, but the fifth 
was paved with asphalt, the discovery of which 
brought to my mind the saying of Solomon that 
' there is nothing new under the sun.' As this 
seemed to me a very singular discovery, I or- 
dered the breaking up of the floor, and after we 
had dug about three feet into it, we were re- 
warded by the discovery of an inscribed terra- 
cotta coffer, with a lid over the mouth, and, on 
biking off the cover, we found therein two terra- 
cotta inscribed cylinders, with a bas-relief on one 
side of it. These relics have been found to be 
the most important records of the oldest city of 
the world, known to the Greeks by the name of 
Sipparn, and mentioned in the Bible as Sephar- 
vaim. (2 Kings viii, 17; and xviii, 34, etc.) The 
ancient historians tell us that this city was 
founded by Noah (who is called Xisuthrus) 
after the Deluge; and, according to tradition, it 
was here that Noah buried the antediluvian 
records. Soon after I had discovered this new 
city, I had to come home, but I left some work- 
men under trustworthy overseers to continue the 
explorations at that place ; and I have been in- 
formed since that they have uncovered some 
more rooms, in one of which they found a chan- 



^8 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

nel built with bricks, inside which were buried 
nearly ten thousand tablets, some whole and 
some broken." ''' 

Rev. Dr. Ward, the conductor of the Wolfe 
expedition to Babylonia in 1885, discovered the 
site of the second city of Sippara, the " Sip- 
para of Anunit" or Agade, at a large mound 
called "Anbar," rivaling Abu Hubba in magni- 
tude. A small tablet records four places — Sipar, 
Sipar edina, Sipar uldua, and Sipar utu. "The 
first would be the chief Sippar of Anunit, and 
the last is Sippar of Shamash. The third is un- 
known, although Sippar ulla is mentioned in a 
geographical text. But the second, Sipar edina, 
would seem to require the translation of ' Sip- 
para of Eden.' This would be, I believe, the 
first time that Eden has been found as the desig- 
nation of a region. . . . This would give 
considerable weight to Delitzsch's theory of the 
location of the Babylonian Eden."-j- 

The oldest form of government in Assyria 
was doubtless theocratic, and earthly rulers were 
but vicegerents of the supreme God, and may 
have belonged originally to the order of priests. 

* Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute, or 
Philosophical Society of (ireat Britain, Auoust, 1S82, Vol. XVI. 
pp. 159, liiO. 

t Ward, Proceedintfs of the American Oi-iental Society, Oc- 
tober, 1885, p. XXX. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 20 

They had the right to sacrifice, while the priest 
stood behind them as subordinate. They were 
absolute moiiarchs, but ruled according to law, 
and consulted with their court, though always 
reserving the right of final decision. They lived 
in great luxury and magnificence, and had ex- 
tensive harems, though queenly honors may have 
been granted to but one of their wives. " They 
were the most cruel nation of antiquity. With- 
out a trace of shame they picture their butcheries 




RUINS OF THE TEMPLE AT KHORSABAD. 

on the walls of their palaces. Maiming was the 
lightest cruelty. The sweetest revenge was to 
flay an enemy alive, and nail his skin to the city 
wall. Impalement was also a favorite torture ; 
and when the king is merry in the garden with 
his spouse, the heads of his conquered enemies 
are hung up before his eyes." 

The old Accadians, from whom the Semites 
inherited much of their culture, had made con- 
siderable progress in science and law. The great 
astronomical work in seventy-two books discusses 



30 FIBE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

eclipses, conjunctions of the sun and moon, spots 
on the sun, stars, and comets. There are 
also predictions of the weather determined by 
the changes of the moon. They had the signs 
of the zodiac, and the week of seven days. Many 
stars and constellations had been named, the 
phases of Venus had been detected, and the 
ecliptic or " yoke of the sky " had been divided 
into three hundred and sixty parts. The year 
had four seasons, twelve months, and three hun- 
dred and sixty days, with intercalary months to 
correct the calendar. The oldest code of laws 
in the world came from Accad. 

In reading the legal treasures, one might almost 
imagine he was reading pleMS of modern lawyers and 
decisions of modern judges. There were the same 
tedious formality, the same citing of precedents, 
and the same care in drawing up, signing, seal- 
ing, and witnessing documents. It was believed 
that the gods favored the just judge, and that 
divine punishments were inflicted upon those 
who received bribes or extorted unlawful tribute. 
An oath was required of the judge each day, by 
which he bound himself to judge according to the 
law and the testimony, and his decisions became 
precedents for the future. Children and slaves 
were protected in certain important rights. De- 
scent was reckoned throusrh the mother, who held 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 31 

the highest rank in the family. Divorce on the 
part of a wife was more blameworthy than 
divorce on the part of a husband. Wives were 
protected in the possession of their own prop- 
erty. Sacrilege was considered a very grave 
offense. Fine and imprisonment were the penal- 
ties for contempt of court. Commissioners were 
appointed for brick-yards and highways ; the 
empire was divided into districts for purposes 
of taxation, as was afterwards done by the 
Persians ; records of the purchase and sale of 
property were carefully preserved; awful curses 
were pronounced upon him who would remove 
his neighbor's landmarks (Deut. xix, 14 ; xxvii, 
17 ; Prov. xxii, 28 ; xxiii, 10), and endowments 
were bestowed upon literary men for celebrating 
the praises of the sovereign. The high esteem 
in which women were held is shown by the ideo- 
graph for mother, which means " deity of the 
house," while the ideograph for father means 
" maker of the nest." * Rural maxims and rustic 
songs show the importance they attached to ag- 
riculture. 

This was a rich inheritance for the victorious 
Semites, and during periods of literary activity 
the caste of scribes were kept busy in trans- 

* Houghton, Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archse- 
Vol. VI, pp. 474, 483, 



32 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

lating Accadian tablets for the benefit of their own 
day and generation. 

The Assyrian king was the priest of his god. 
Sargon is called ''the exalted priest" and "the 
high-priest," and Nebuchadnezzar designates him- 
self " the supreme high-priest." (1 8ani. xiii, 
9 ; 2 Sam. vi, 17, 18 ; 2 Chron. vi, 5.) Below 
the king in dignity was the religious high-priest, 
under wdiom were ranged several classes of priests 
of subordinate rank. The high-priest was at- 
tached to the cult of the supreme god of his 
country, and the subordinate priests w^ere conse- 
crated to special places of worship. These priests 
purified with oil both persons and things, poured 
out libations, presented holy offerings, and offered 
sacrifices. The temples of Babylon were pro- 
vided with large basins of water placed in the 
great court, and used for purposes of purifi- 
cation. 

The temple of Merodach at Babylon had a 
second court — that of " Istar and Zamama " — 
within which was a walled inclosure, containing 
the great tower and temples and chapels of many 
deities. The Holy of Holies, in the innermost 
temple, was, according to Nebuchadnezzar, " the 
holy seat, the place of the gods who determine 
destiny, the spot where they assemble together (?), 
the shrine of fate, wherein on the festival of 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 33 

Zagiiiiikii, at the beginning of the year, on the 
eighth and the eleventh days, the divine king of 
heaven and earth, the lord of the heavens, seats 
himself, while the gods of heaven and earth 
listen to him in fear, [and] stand bowing down 
before him." The cult of the many gods had 
its center at Babylon. 

Herodotus gives the following description : 
*' The center of each divisioii of the town was 
occupied by a fortress. In the one stood the 
palace of the kings, surrounded by a wall of 
great strength and size ; in the other was the 
sacred precinct of Jupiter Belus, a square in- 
closure, two furlongs each way, with gates of 
solid masonry, a furlong in length and breadth, 
upon which was raised a second tower, and on 
that a third, and so on up to eight. The ascent 
to the top is on the outside, by a path which 
winds round all the towers. When one is about 
half-way up, one finds a resting-place and seats, 
where persons are wont to sit some time on their 
way to the summit. 

"On the topmost tower there is a spacious 
temple, and inside the temple stands a couch of 
unusual size, richly adorned, with a golden table 
by its side. There is no statue of any kind set 
up in the place, nor is the chamber occupied of 
nights by any one but a single native woman. . . . 



34 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

They also declare — but I. for my part, do not 
credit it — that the god comes down in person 
into this chamber, and sleeps upon the couch. . . . 
Below, in the same precinct, there is a second 
temple, in w'hich is a sitting figure of Jupiter, all 
of gold. Before the figure stands a large golden 
table, and the throne whereon it sits, and the 
base on which the throne rests, are likewise of 
gold. The Chakheans told me that all the gold 
together was eight hundred talents' weight. Out- 
side the temple are two altars, one of solid gold, 
on which it is only lawful to offer sucklings ; the 
other a common altar, but of great size, on w^hich 
the full-grown animals are sacrificed. It is also 
on the great altar that the Chald?eans burn the 
frankincense, which is offered to the amount of 
a thousand talents' weight, every year, at the 
festival of the god. In the time of Cyrus there 
was likewise in this temple the figure of a man, 
twelve cubits high, entirely of solid gold."* 
Herodotus is correct except when he enters into 
details. 

This temple Avas called E-Saggil, " the house 
of the raising of the head." The special sanc- 
tuary of Merodach was E-Kua, " the house of the 
oracle," the walls of which Nebuchadnezzar en- 



■Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 64, 65; Herodotus I, 
181-183. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 



35 



riched with " glittering gold." Within the pre- 
cinct of the great god was the chapel of Nebo, 
his son, called E-Zida, in which was the Holy of 
Holies, to which Merodach descended at the great 
festival at the beginning of the year. The tower 
of eight stages was P]-Te- 
men-gurum, " the house of 
the foundation - stone of 
heaven and earth," and the 
topmost chamber was used 
as an observatory. 

Assurbanipal repaired 
this celebrated temple and 
writes : " E-Sagili (the tern 
pie) of the lord of gods I 
made. I completed its 
decorations. The mother 
Bilat, the protectress, of 
Babylon. Hea and Shamas 
from the midst of the tem- 
ple I brought. I caused 
them to enter into the city 
of Suanna (the sacred quar- 
ter of Babylon). Their 
noble shrine I adorned with fifty talents of 
bronze. I adorned ; with bricks I fin- 
ished and enlarged upon it. I caused a ceil- 
ing of cedar-wood to be made beautiful as the 




Assyrian Figure. 



36 FIRE FROM STRA NG E AL TA RS. ' 

stars of heaven, adoineil with beaten gokl. Over 
Merodach, the lord of the gods. I rejoiced my 
heart. I worshiped hiiii and performed his will. 
A noble chariot, the carriage of Merodach, prince 
of the gods ; with silver, gold, and precious stones 
I finished its work. To Merodach, king of the 
hosts of heaven and earth, the sweeper away of 
my enemies, a couch of acacia-wood, for the 
holy place adorned with precious stones, silver, 
and gold, as the resting-place of Bel and Bilat — 
givers of favor, makers of friendship — skillfully 
I made." '•' 

In the chapel of Makhir, " the god of dreams," 
discovered by Mr. Rassani at Balawat, was found 
a marble coffer containing two stone tablets. 
This coffer resembled the arks or ships in which 
the images and symbols of the gods were carried 
in procession. The records furnish us with ac- 
counts of making these images of the gods. We 
also possess an old hymn which was recited when 
a new image was made in honor of " the ship of 
enthronement of Merodach :" 

" Its helm is of cedar (?) wood, . . . 
Its serpent-like oar has a handle of gold. 
Its mast is pointed with turquoise. 
Seven times seven lions of the field (Eden) occupy its 

deck. 
The god Adar fills its cabin built within. 



Boscaweu, From Under the Dust of Ages, pp. 14, 15. 



LITER ATVRE, PRIESTS, AND TEMPLES. 37 

Its side is of cedar from its forest. 

Its awning is the palm (?) wood of Dilvun. 

Carrying away (its) heart is the canal. 

Making glad its heart is the sunrise. 

Its house, its ascent, is a mountain that gives rest to 
the heart. 

The ship of Ea is Destiny. 

Nin-gal, the princess (Dav-kiua*), is the goddess Avhose 
word is life. 

Merodach is the god who pronounces the good name. 

The goddess who benefits the house, the messenger of 
Ea, the ruler of the earth, even Nan-gar (the 
lady of work), the bright one, the mighty work- 
woman of heaven, with pure (and) blissful hand, 
has uttered the word of life. 
'May the ship before thee cross the canal! 

May the ship behind thee sail over its mouth ! 

Within thee may the heart rejoicing make holiday !'"-'' 

These festivals were numerous in Babylonia. 
Other hymns commemorate the festival itself. 

Merodach was supreme among the gods only 
when Babylon was the capital of Babylonia. 
His temple had within its vast inclosure shrines 
for all the principal gods of the nation. Herein 
it differed from temples dedicated to a single 
divinity. We can not fail to remark the close 
resemblance which we are able to trace between 
these temples and the temple of Solomon. 

The temple was called "the House of God," 
"Resting-place of the God," "Dwelling of the 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 67. 



38 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

God," "Palace of the God," "High Place," 
" Great House," " Palace," " House of the Lofty 
Head," " House of Life," " House of Heaven," 
" House of Light," " House of Scepter," " House 
of Bowing Down of the Head," " House of the 
Great Flame," "House of Love," and so on/-' 

But little is known from the monuments con- 
cerning the dress of the ancient Chaldiean priests. 
Bepresentations show them with shnven heads, 
and wearing a plain robe bound with a girdle.' 
The head-dress was a curious conical affair, if we 
trust to the representation of the priest in one 
of the sculptures of the time of Assurbanipal. 
The king, when he acted as chief pontiff, wore a 
breastplate adorned with twelve precious stones. 
(Exod. xxviii, 15-2L) The revenue of the 
priests was derived from tithes paid in kind and 
temple estates. 

The adornments for the images of the gods 
are sometimes mentioned — blue robes, robes 
woven with gold, gold crowns of divinity set 
with precious stones, beautiful dresses, striped 
robes, beautiful starred robes, robes of open work, 
and so on. 

The sacrifices included burnt-offerings, sin- 
offerings, peace-offerings, and wave-offerings ; and 
there were also meat-offerings and drink-offerings. 

■ Boscaweu, Vroiu Uudcr the Dust of Ages, pp. 4, 11. 



LITERATURE, PRIESTS, AXD TEMPLES. 



39 



There is more than one mention of "first- 
fruits." The victims were to be perfect — "sheep, 
pure, large, and well-favored." These sacrifices 
closely resembled those of the Israelites. We note, 
however, one conspic- 
uous difference — the 
Israelites offered 
neither honey, milk, 
nor butter, and honey 
was strictly forbid- 
den. (Lev. ii, 11.) 
But Nebuchadnezzar 
says : " The portion 
of the gods of E-Sag- 
ili aiid Babylon, to 
each a daily portion 
prepared. I appor- 
tioned honey, milk, 
beautiful butter, and 
bread made with oil ; 
honey -wine, sweet 
syrup drink, and no- 
ble wines." The Sip- 
para tablet gives the portions of the victims 
which are given to the priests : " The rump, the 
tail, the skin, and the flanks, together with choice 
portions of the stomach and intestines, were to 
go to the priests, leaving the head and shoulders, 




Chald.^an Priests, 
(Bearing the Image of Bel.) 



40 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

with certain portions of fat, for the sacrifices." 
The Marseilles and Carthage documents contain 
similar provisions.* 

In the earliest times, human sacrifices had 
been offered, and human flesh consumed in honor 
of the spirits of the earth. In a tablet it is de- 
clared that it is unlawful to eat '' the flesh of 
a man, the flesh of the gazelle, the flesh of the 
dog, the flesh of the wild boar, the flesh of the 
ass, the flesh of the horse, the flesh of the wild 
ass, M.nd the flesh of the drngon." Another tab- 
let contains a hymn to the god Tutu : " Thou art 
exalted in heaven ; in the world thou feedest on 
mankind ; thou art princely in the earth, the flesh 
of their hearts thou eatest, the flesh in abundance 
thou eatest. "f 

Reptiles were accounted most unclean, and the 
very mention of the pig is unknown in Semitic in- 
scriptions. It is most profitable to compare all 
of this with the laws concerning sacrifices as re- 
corded in the Pentateuch.! 



■■ Boscawen, From Under the Du.st of Ages. p. 21 ; Fratlen- 
burgh, Witnesses from the Dust, pp. 314-310 ; cf. Ia'v. vii. 28-34 , 
Num. xviii, 8-19. 

t iSayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 83, 84. 

t Consult with profit W. Robertson Smith, Tlie ReHgion of 
the Semites, Fundamental Institutions, \). 19G, et seq. 



II. 

THE BLACK ART. 

THE Babylonian and Assyrian religion, as re- 
vealed by the monuments, is the product of 
the fusion of the two religious systems of the 
Accadians and the Semites. This religious refor- 
mation dates from the time of Sargon of Accad. 
We are not able to separate these systems so ns 
to study each by itself throughout the whole 
history of its development, but we may begin 
with the Accadian elemental worship, which 
figured largely also in the Semitic faith. 

"There is a complete world of malevolent spirits, 
the distinguishing characteristics of which are 
strongly marked, and their attributes determined 
with precision ; while the hierarchy to which 
they belong is classed in a most learned manner. 
At the top of the scale are placed two classes 
of beings, which partake more nearly than the 
others of the divine nature, and are genii or 
demi-gods, a sort of inferior deities. The first 
bear the Accadian name, Mas, ' soldier, warrior 5' 
the second the Accadian name of Lmnma, ' giant,' 
translated in Assyrian by Lamas. In the re- 
ligious texts these names often designate propi- 



42 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

tious and protecting genii, under whose shelter 
people place themselves; but, at other times, 
wicked and hurtful genii, whose power had to be 
charmed away." 




The moral element seems to have been alto- 
gether wanting in the beginnings of this phase 
of faith. The benefits or injuries received from 
the visible things of nature were capricious and 



THE BLACK ART. 43 

accidental, and entirely independent of the 
thoughts and actions of men. These spirits of 
nature, at the first, were not moved by passions 
or emotions. If they were to be influenced at 
all, it must be by an appeal to their love, hatred, 
pride, or jealousy. 

When the power of the exorcist or medicine- 
man was required to cast out the spirits which 
caused diseases in man, then the spirits of these 
inferior orders were looked upon as demons, and 
decidedly malevolent. They were called " de- 
stroyers, warriors, ensnarers." Each class was 
frequently divided into groups of seven. Among 
the Jews there were seven principal angels, one 
of whom was Raphael. (Tobit xii, 15.) The 
rank of demons — when they formed a hierarchy — 
was designated by numbers, as the rank of each 
god was also designated by a number; in the 
latter case by a whole number, from one to sixty ; 
in the former, by a fraction, with sixty for the 
denominator. 

The Maskim, " ensnarers," cosmical demons, 
possessed the power of disturbing the order of 
nature. They dwelt in the abyss, and the god 
of fire was their great antagonist. 

" From the four cardinal points the impetuosity of their in- 
vasion burns like fire. 
They violently attack the dwellings of man. 



44 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

They wither everything iu the town or in the country. 
They oppose the freeman and the slave. 
They pour down lilce a violent tempest iu heaven and 
earth." 

Elemental malevolent spirits, the production 
of the infernal regions, were present everywhere, 
and struck terror into the minds and hearts of 
these simple and superstitious people. 

"On high they bring trouble, and below they bring con- 
fusion ; 
Falling in rain from the sk}', issuing from the earth, 
They penetrate the strong timbers, the thick timbers ; 
They pass from house to house ; 
Doors do not stop them, 
Bolts do not stop them ; 
They glide in at the doors like serpents. 
They enter the windows like the wind." '^ 

They people all deserts, mountains, marshes, 
and seas, and rush from their gloomy abodes only 
to torment men. When they possess the body of 
a man, resort to exorcisms and incantations is the 
standard remedy — to drive out evil spirits and 
invite favorable demons.f All diseases were 
thought to be the work of diiferent classes of 
demons, who possessed different parts of the 
body, and against whom only exorcisms, incan- 
tations, and enchanted drinks were efficacious. 

*Lenormaut, Chald«3an Magic, pp. 23-30. 

t Cf. Josephus, Antiquities viii, 25 ; Justin Martyr, Dialogue 
with Trypho, 85; Isa. xxxv, 13, 14; Matt, xii, 27 ; Acts xix, 13- 
IG; Tobit vi, 7, 16, 17. 



THE BLACK ART. 45 

Namtar and Idpa were the demons of the 
plague and the fever. Utuq seized upon and 
possessed the forehead, Ahil the breust, Gigim 
the bowels, and Telal the hand. No part of the 
body was proof against the invasion of hostile 
demons. Sometimes demons appeared to men in 
visible form. Such were the Innin, the Uruku, 
the Phantom, the Specter, and the Vampire. The 
last even attacked and sought to destroy men. 
The dead were believed to come forth from their 
tombs in the form of vampires. The Incubus, 
the Succubus, and the Nightmare were demons 
greatly to be dreaded. The power of " the evil 
eye " and " the malevolent mouth," caused mortal 
terror.* 

It must be remarked that a complete knowl- 
edge of Chald?ean magic in its full development 
belonged doubtless only to the priests or medi- 
cine-men, yet every one must needs have known 
something concerning the incantations and rites 
which were necessary in the common exigencies 
of life. 

Purifications were multiplied, and magic knots 
possessed, in the opinion of the old Accadians, 
wonderful potency, while the power of numbers, 
especially of the sacred number seven, was very 
great. 

* Lenormaut. Chaldseau Maaiic, pp. 36, 38. 



46 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

To insure a good harvest, the Accadian sung : 

" The corn which stands upright shall come to the end of 

its prosperous growth ; 
The number (to produce that) we know it." ■'^ 

The divine name, known only to E;i, was the 
most powerful charm of all. Everything must 
yield to that name ; and it was even made a dis- 
tinct person. We may profitably compare the 
powers which the Talmudists and Cabalists be- 
lieved were hidden in the name of God. Talis- 
mans and sacred texts were worn as charms, and 
talismanic images, placed on guard to protect the 
inmates of dwellings, were supplied with food and 
drink, that they might abide contentedly ,'it their 
posts, and ever possess well-disposed and friendly 
minds. A magic hymn invites and prays : 

"In sublime dishes eat sublime food. 
From sublime cups drink sublime ^vaters. 
May thine ear be disposed to judge favorably of the 
king, son of his god !" 

Sometimes a monstrous image of a demon was 
made and used as a talisman. It was apparently 
believed that even the demon himself would be 
frightened away by the sight of his own hideous 
likeness. Many gnostic gems also contain such 
nionstrous representations. 

* Leuormaut, Cliakliean INIagic, p. 42 ; Horace, Carmen 
xi, 2, 3. 



THE BLACK ART. 47 

To cure a man of the plague, it was prescribed 
that his face should be turned toward the setting- 
sun, and a talisnianic image applied "to the 
living flesh of his body," when it wns believed 
that the plague-demon would flee away. To 
protect against the deadly influence of the south- 
west wind, its frightful image — '' the figure of a 
horrible demon in an upiight posture, with the 
body of a dog, the feet of an eagle, the claws of 
a lion, the tail of a scorpion, the head of a skel- 
eton but half decayed, and adorned with goats' 
horns, and the eyes still remaining, and lastly four 
great expanded wings " — was placed as a guard 
at the door or window, and the deadly wind dare 
not enter. Many of these talisnianic images have 
been discovered, and are now to be found in the 
museums.* Tiamat, the primordial sea, was rep- 
resented in this manner, and the first created 
beings were imperfect and of this monstrous 
character. Representations of battles, in which 
the gods are victorious over the demons, were 
placed upon the walls of the dwellings to secure 
the defeat of evil spirits. The ChaldiBans, by 
their black arts, professed to have supernatural 
power over all spirits, both good and bad. They 
could at their pleasure ally themselves with di- 
vine or demoniacal powers. 

* Lenormant, Chaldtean Magic, pp. 51, 52. 



48 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Hence the importance of sorcery and witch- 
craft became very great, and their influence was 
felt in all religious rites. The gods Ea and 
the Sun were the chief protectors against sor- 
ceries. So great was the fear of the influence 
of these gods, that the practices of sorcerers were 
described in language which was understood only 
by the initiated, though the Assyrian translations 
of Accadian originals were more explicit. The 
magic spell would even, as it was confidently be- 
lieved, destroy life. 

The sorcerer would utter terrible imprecations, 
which would unloose hostile demons and turn 
beneficent divinities into enemies. 

" The malicious imprecation acts ou man like a wicked 

demon ; 
The voice which curses has power over liim ; 
The voice which curses has power over him ; 
The malicious imprecation is the spell (which produces) 

the disease of the head. 

The malicious imprecation slaughters this man like a lamb ; 
His god oppresses him in his body ; 

His goddess creates anguish in him by a reciprocal in- 
fluence, 
The voice which curses him and loads him like a veil.'' * 

The sorcerer made a drink of herbs, and pro- 
nounced an incantation over it, and it became, as 



Leuormaut, Chaldiean Magic, pp. 04, G5. 



THE BLACK ART. 49 

he pretended to believe, a deadly poison. He 
formed an image of a man from wax, and melted 
it in the fire, when the life of the one whom it 
represented would waste away as the image 
melted in the flame. 

It will be seen that the religion of the Acca- 
dians was a performance rather than a worship. 
We may learn still more of its character by a 
careful study of the multitude of magic formulae 
to which it has given rise. We present several 
of these formuhe : 

" Him Avho is the possessor of the images of a man, 

Tlie evil face, the evil eye. 

The evil mouth, the evil tongue, 

The evil lip, the evil breath, 

Conjure, O spirit of heaven! conjure, O spirit of earth!" 

** The painful fever, the potent fever, 

The fever which quits not a man, 

The fever-demon who departs not. 

The fever unremovable, the evil fever, 

Conjure, spirit of heaven! conjure, O spirit of earth !" 

"The painful plague, the potent plague. 

The plague which quits not a man. 

The plague-demon who departs not. 

The plague unremovable, the evil plague, 

Conjure, O spirit of heaven! conjure, O spirit of earth!" 

" May Nin-akha-Kudda, the mistress of spells, 
The spell of Eridu, 
Utter with pure mouth ; 
May Bahu the great mother, 



50 FIRE FROM STRA NGE A L TA RS. 

The generatress of mankind, 

Restore the blessing of health to the body ; may Gula 

With quieting hand the consecrated water, the water which 

the air has warmed, 
Send into his body ! 
The sickness of the head, the sickness of the mouth, the 

sickness of the heart, 
The sickness of the entrails (the sickness of the eye), 
The ebbing sea, the rising sea. 
The flood, the high-tide. 

The water of the Tigris, the water of the Euphrates, 
The mountain of the night, the mountain of the sunrise. 
The mountain of the center. 
May they turn back their breast ! 
Conjure, O spirit of heaven ! conjure, O spirit of earth!" 

' ' Seven are they, seven are they ; 

In the hollow of the deep, seven are they ; 

Gleams of the sky are those seven. 

In the hollow of the deep, in a palace, they grew up. 

Male they are not, female they are not. 

They are whirlwind-like ghosts ; travelers are they. 

Wife they possess not, child they beget not. 

Compassion and kindness know they not. 

Prayer and supplication hear they not. 

Horses which are bred in the mountains are they. 

Unto Ea are they hostile. 

The throne-bearers of the gods are they. - 

To trouble the canal in the street are they set. 

Evil are they, evil are they! 

Seven are they, seven are they, seven twice again are they! 

O spirit of heaven, conjure! spirit of earth, conjure!" 

" Like this garlic which is peeled and cast into the fire, 
The burning flame shall consume (it) ; 
In the garden it shall not be planted, 



THE BLACK ART. 51 

In pool or canal it shall not be placed ; 

Its root shall not take the earth ; 

Its stem shall not grow, and shall not see the sun ; 

For the food of god and king it shall not be used. 

(So) may the guardian-priest cause the ban to depart from 

him, (and) unloose the bond 
Of the torturing disease, the sin, the backsliding, the 

wickedness, the sinning, 
The disease which exists in my body, my flesh, (and) my 

muscles. 
Like this garlic, may It be peeled ofl^, and 
On this day may the burning flame consume ! 
May the ban depart that I may see the light !" 

"Like this date which is cut and cast into the fire. 

The bui'ning flame shall consume (it). 

To its stalk he who plucks (it) shall not restore (it), 

For the dish of the king it shall not be used ; 

(So) may the guardian priest cause the ban to depart from 

him, (and) unloose the bond 
Of the torturing disease, the sin, the backsliding, the 

Avickedness, the sinning, 
The disease which exists in my body, my flesh (and) my 

muscles. 
Like this date may it be cut, and 
On this day may the burning flame consume (it) ! 
May the ban depart that I may see the light!" 

"Like this wool which is torn and cast into the fire, 

j\Iay the burning flame consume (it) ! 

To the back of its sheep it shall not return ; 

For the clothing of god and king it shall not be used. 

(So) may the guardian-priest cause the ban to depart from 

him, (and) unloose the bond 
Of the torturing disease, the sin, the backsliding, the 

wickedness, the sinning, 



52 FIRE FROM STBANGE ALTARS. 

The evil which exists in my body, my flesh, (and) my 

muscles. 
Like this wool may it he torn, and 
On this day may the burning flame consume (it) ! 
May the ban depart that I may see the light!" 

"Like this goat's hair, which is torn and cast into the fire, 

The burning flame shall consume (it) ; 

To the back of its goat it shall not return, 

For the work of dyeing it shall not be used. 

(So) may the guardian-priest cause the ban to depart from 

him, (and) unloose the bond 
Of the torturing disease, the sin, the backsliding, the 

wickedness, the sinning. 
The evil which exists in my body, my flesh, (and) my 

muscles ! 
Like this goat's hair, may it be torn, and 
On this day may the burning flame consume (it) ! 
May the ban depart that I may see the light!" 

" Take the skin of a suckling that is still ungrown ; 

Let the wise woman bind (it) to the right hand, and double 
it on the left. 

Bind the knot twice seven times ; 

Lay (upon it) the spell of Eridu ; 

Bind the head of the sick man ; 

Bind the neck of the sick man ; 

Bind his life ; 

Bind firmly his limbs; 

Approach his bed ; 

Pour over him the magical waters ; 

Alay the disease of the head, like the eye, when it rests it- 
self, ascend to heaven ! 

Like the waters of an ebbing (flood), to tiie earth may it 
descend ! 

^lay the word of Ea issue forth ! 



THE BLACK ART. 53 

IMay Dav-kiua direct ! 

O Merf)c1ach, first-born of the deep, thou canst make pure 
and prospeious !" 

" The madness is bound in lieaven, from the earth it is 
driven away. 

The power of the freeman, the master of power, is opened 
(afresh). 

The hand of the fruitful handmaid returns not, 

AVliich is laid on the body of the sick. 

As for Istar, who rejoices in quietude, one that exists not 
causes her train to descend from the mountain. 

To the form of the sick man they a}>proach ; 

She raises a cry of lamentation over the man ; 

' Who takes (it) away? who gives (him) health ? 

Even Istar, the daughter of Sin ; 

The mighty father, the son of Mul-lil ; 

(And) Merodach, the son of Eridu. 

May they give health to the body of the sick man !' 

The god who adorns the gate (?), who (issues ?) the com- 
mand, has bound his (body). 

On the butter which is brought from a pure stall. 

The milk which is brought from a pure sheep-cote. 

The pure butter of the pure stall lay a spell. 

May the ma}i, the son of his good, recover; 

May the man be bright and pure as the butter ; 

May he be white as this milk ; 

Like refined silver may his firm flesh glisten ; 

Like copper may it shine as a polished vessel ! 

To the Sun-god, the first-born of the gods, confide his 
body. 

May the Sun-god, the first-born of the gods, to the pros- 
pering hands of his god confide him!"* 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 442, 443, 449, 457, 458, 
472-474, 460-462. 



54 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

These spirits, definite and distinct personali- 
ties, were innuniernble, and filled the whole uni- 
verse, and were the active cause of all the oper- 
ations of nature. They were not spirits in any 
modern sense. " The zi was simply that which 
manifested life, and the test of the manifestation 
of life was movement. Everything that moved, 
or seemed to move, was endowed with life, for 
only in this way could primitive man explain the 
fact. He himself moved and acted because he 
had life ; life, therefore, was the cause of move- 
ment. Hence, the objects and forces of nature 
were all assigned a .?/, or spirit. The arrow that 
flew through the air, the stone that struck and 
injured, the heavenly bodies that moved across 
the sky, the fire that blazed up from the ground, 
devouring all that fell in its way, had all alike 
these spirits. The spirits were as innumerable 
as the objects and forces which surrounded the 
Chaldnean, and as mysterious and invisible as his 
own spirit or life."* 

When these spirits came to possess, in the 
belief of the Accadians, moral character, a deadly 
warfare was constantly waged between the good 
and the bad. The benefits which bless and the 
plagues which afflict humanity, were thought to 
be the results of the victories and defeats of the 



■■■■ Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 327, 328. 



THE BLACK ART. 55 

good spirits. An evil spirit and a good spirit 
were connected with every object and every ele- 
ment in the universe, and struggled for the mas- 
tery. War was necessary, peace impossible. 
Physical discords were battles between these 
spirits. Sin was the neglect of religious rites, 
or communion with wicked demons. This 
vast dualistic system tyrannized over the people, 
and it was the very basis of Chaldsean magic. It 
was impossible to do otherwise than to commu- 
nicate with spirits. 

The Jews believed that angels could fall in 
love with beautiful women. Lenormant has an 
exhaustive discussion upon this subject, showing 
vast erudition and wide research, and sustaining 
his position by numerous authorities.* 

Evil spirits must be driven away, and good 
spirits must be gained and strengthened ; and 
hence the importance of mysterious rites, charms, 
talismans, and powerful secrets. The only wny 
of happiness and peace was to resort to the magi- 
cians, who could protect men, prevent direct calam- 
ities, and control the forces of the unseen world. 

Good and evil spirits were classified, and at 
the summit of the hierarchy were placed certain 
gods, which were yet no gods, but beings which 

'•■■ Tobit ^d, 4 ; Augustine, The City of God, 23 ; Lenormant, 
Beginnings of History, pp. 293-381, 



56 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

possessed a higher range of the same power as 
was possessed by the inferior orders of spirits. 
Ana was the spirit of heaven, and was also even 
considered the material heavens. Ea was the 
soul of the inhabited earth, and also the dwelling 
of all animated beings. He was the god of 
science, the protector of men, and the gunrdian 
of the world. His spouse, Dav-kina, was the 
personification of the surffice of the earth. Mul- 
lil was the god of the solid earth, and especially 
of the lower world, "the temple of the dead." 
In that gloomy realm there were no marked dis- 
tinctions of rewards and punishment. Some who 
Avere permitted to drink of the water of life 
could again visit the upper world. The demons 
of the under-world loved darkness, and came 
forth in the night season to torment men and to 
lead them into mischief. The sun, their special 
enemy, triumphed over the black spirits every 
morning. The Accadians dreaded the night and 
darkness, while the Semitic Chaldneans loved to 
behold the glories of the starry sky. 

Hitherto we have spoken of the religion as 
Accadian, and have called the language of the 
magic texts Accadian, But there were several 
stages of development before the religion attained 
an organized form with the old triad of gods — 
Ana, Mul-lil, and Ea — standing at the head of 



THE BLACK ART. 57 

the hierarchy. Originally it was a mere Anini- 
i.sm — the spirits neither good nor bad. When a 
moral element was introduced, the demons, es- 
pecially manifesting their power in causing dis- 
ease, became decidedly evil and malevolent. 
The religion had now reached the stage of Sham- 
anism, which is in fact only an organized An- 
imism. 

But animals had also their special'spirits, and 
these shared their feelings and passions. Hence 
we have a Totemism which maintained its posi- 
tion side by side with Shamanism. When dis- 
tinctions between good and evil demons were 
recognized, the exorcists approximated the char- 
acter of priests. 

The magic texts which have been presented, 
a.pJDeal to the spirits of heaven and earth to con- 
jure in favor of the sick and the afflicted. All 
other spirits were subordinate to these great and 
beneficent spirits, and the good was made su- 
perior to the evil. It was but a step and these 
beneficent spirits became creators, and other 
spirits also were soon deified. This may be the 
correct account of the origin of the gods. The 
sorcerer, in this developed form of religion, would 
become a sorcerer-priest. In his hands was the 
power of fate, which even the gods were com- 
pelled to obey. With the advent of creative 



58 FIRE FROM STRAXGE ALTARS. 

gods, praise and adoration were added to spells 
and incantations. Temples and a fixed ritual 
became necessary. Religious performance be- 
came religious worship. There arose a litany, 
between which and the old magic lies a . whole 
age of religious development. 

" The fundamental conception of the preced- 
ing period, it is true, still surviA'es; the deities 
must be influenced by the spoken word of their 
worshiper. But the spoken word has ceased to 
be the spell or incantation ; it has become a 
prayer and supplication. Its efficacy depends no 
longer on the exorcisms of a medicine-man, but 
on the faithful petitions of the worshiper him- 
self. And along with this change in the nature 
of the cult has gone a corresponding change in 
the divine beings to whom the cult is dedicated. 
They have become gods, bound together in a 
common brotherhood, like the brotherhood of the 
cities over whose fortunes they preside."* Old 
forms remained, but they were losing their power. 

There came also the period of hymns and 
penitential psalms, and while the earliest literature 
is in the Sumerian language of the South, much 
of the later literature is in the Accadian of the 
North. In these later stages in the development 
of the Accadian religion, we can not fail to recog- 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 337. 



THE BLACK ART. 59 

nize Semitic influence. We quote a psalm which 
reminds us, in several places, of the langucige of 
the Old Testament : 

' ' The heart of my lord is wroth ; may it be appeased ! 

May the god whom I kuow not be appeased ! 

May the goddess whom I kuow not be appeased ! 

May the god I know and (the god) I kuow not be ap- 
peased ! 

May the goddess I know and (the goddess) I know uot be 
appeased ! 

May the heart of ray god be appeased ! 

May the heart of my goddess be appeased ! 

May the god and the goddess I know aud I kuow not be 
appeased ! 

May the god who (has been violent against me) be ap- 
peased ! 

May the goddess (who has been violent against me) be ap- 
peased ! 

The sin that (I sinned I) knew not. 

The sin (that I committed I knew not). 

A name of blessing (may my god pronounce upon me !) 

A name of blessing (may the god I know and kuow not) 
record for me ! 

A name of blessing (may the goddess I kuow and know 
not) pronounce upon me ! 

(Pure) food I have (not) eaten. 

Clear water I have (not) drunk. 

The cursed thing of my god unknowingly did I eat ; 

The cursed thing of my goddess unknowingly did I tram- 
ple on. 

O lord, my sins are many, my transgressions are great ! 

O my god, my sins are many, my transgressions are great ! 

my goddess, my sins are many, my transgressions are great ! 



60 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

O god, whom I know and whom I kuow not, my sius are 
many, my transgressions are great! 

goddess, whom I kuow and whom I know not, iny sius 

are many, my transgressions are great ! 

The sin that I sinned I knew not. 

The transgression I committed I knew not. 

The cursed thing that I ate I knew not. 

The cursed thing that I trampled on I knew not. 

The lord iu the wrath of his heart has regarded me; 

God in the fierceness of his heart has revealed himself 
to me. 

The goddess has been violent against mc and has put me 
to grief. 

The god Avhom I know and whom I kuow not has dis- 
tressed me. 

The goddess whom I know and whom I know not has in 
flicted trouble. 

1 sought for help and none took my hand ; 
I wept and none stood at my side ; 

I cried aloud, and there was none that heard me. 

I am in trouble and hiding ; I dare not look up. 

To my god, the merciful one, I turn myself, I utter my 

prayer ; 
The feet of my goddess I kiss and water with tears. 
To the god whom I know and whom I know not 1 utter 

my prayer. 
O lord, look upon (me; receive my prayer!) 
O goddess, look upon (me ; accept my prayer !) 
O god whom I know (and whom I know not, accept my 

prayer ! ) 
How long, O god, (shall I suffer?) 

How long, O goddess, (shall thy face be turned from me?) 
How long, O god whom I know and know not, shall the 

fierceness (of thy heart continue ?) 



THE BLACK ABT. fil 

How loug, O goddess whom I know aud know uot, shall 

thy heart in its hostility be (not) appeased ? 
Alankind is made to wander,- and there is none that 

knoweth. 
Mankind, as many as pronounce a name, what do they 

know ? 
"Whether he shall have good or ill, there is none that 

knoweth. 
O lord, destroy not thy servant! 

When cast into the water of the ocean ('?), take his hand. 
The sins I have sinned turn to a blessing. 
The transgressions I have committed may the wind carry 

away ! 
Strip off my manifold wickedness as a garment. 
my god, seven times seven are my transgressions ; for- 
give my sins ! 
O my goddess, seven times seven are my transgressions ; 

forgive my sins ! 
O god whom I know and whom I- know not, seven times 

seven are my transgressions ; forgive my sins ! 
O goddess whom I know and whom I know not, seven times 

seven are my transgressions ; forgive my sins ! 
Forgive my sins ; may thy ban be removed ! 
May thy heart be appeased as the heart of a mother who 

has borne children ! 
As a mother who has borne children, as a father who has 

begotten them, may it be appeased !" ^ 

Here is the recognition of sin and a devotional 
spirit which are new in the religion of the old Chal- 
dseans. The sin, however, which is recognized, 
is sin only in a gross sense — eating forbidden 



Sayce, Hibbert Lectm-es, 1887, pp. 349-352. 



62 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

food, and trampling on the accursed. It is not 
sin of the heart, but something which has been 
done through ignorance. But still it is a great 
advance upon the theology of the days of the 
early magic. Again, each god has his consort. 
This is not Accadian.. In this primitive langunge 
there are no distinctions of gender, and the divin- 
ities are independent of all family relationships. 
But with these marks of Semitic influence there 
are to be found abundant remnants of old super- 
stitions. 

Seven figures as a magic number, and names, 
possess a mysterious power. Because the pen- 
itent does not know the name of the offended 
divinity, or because he thinks that the god does 
not wish his name to be mentioned at all, or, 
again, because he fears to speak the name lest it 
may be incorrectly pronounced, he seeks to con- 
ceal it and yet embrace it under the comprehen- 
sive title of gods and goddesses whom he knows 
and whom he does not know. 

The magical texts form the oldest collection 
of literary remains in the land between the 
rivers. But there is no sharp chronological line 
which marks the time when the composition of 
magical texts ceased, and the production of more 
devotional works began. jNIany hymns are older 
than these texts, and many magical texts were 



THE BLACK ART. 0:3 

pi'oduced in an age of comparatively advanced 
religious culture. " Nothing is more common 
than to find a magical text breaking off into a 
hymn, or a fragment of a hymn, the recitation of 
which forms part of the spell or ceremony;' 

A hymn also may end in words of purely 
magical import. And then, too, there are 
poetical addresses to deities employed as spells 
in medical practice. The patient has frequently 
the choice between medicines prepared somewhat 
after the manner of the regular practitioner of the 
present day, and the employment of a spell which 
has been held sacred from days of old. Some- 
times, by the side of hymns to the gods, there 
are corresponding hymns to inferior orders of 
beings. Legendary poems might be employed 
as spells. We learn, then, the connection be- 
tween magical texts and some of the hymns. 
The latter were used as mystical incantations, 
which were recited Avhile the magic rites were 
in progress. 

The Accadian language became sacred, and 
maintained its position for centuries. Great im- 
portance was attached to the mere words of this 
old tongue. It became the vehicle of religious 
instruction, and learned men, during periods of 
literary activity in Assyria, were busy in trans- 
lating Semitic texts into this language of the gods. 



04 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

For purposes of popular instruction, they also 
'made translations from Sumerian and Accadian 
into Assyrian. Sometimes the Semites composed 
directly in the Accadian language. At a later 
period, it began to lose its religious prestige, and 
the later Assyrian came into more general use in 
all literary productions. 

Many of the ancient writings have suffered 
from interpolations, and it is not unconmion to 
find the names of modern deities substituted, in 
Assyrian versions, for Proto-Chaldjean names. 
Texts which are introduced by "spell" or "in- 
cantation" — siptii in Assja-ian, cu in Accadian — 
are not always thereby designated to be employed 
in a magical manner, for sipiu in the later language, 
and in such connection, has come to mean only 
" to be recited." It will be seen how difficult 
a task it is to fix the date of documents so 
constructed and handled, and to determine with 
precision their teachings and implications. 
We can only arrive at an approximation to ac- 
curacy. 

The science of divination filled a large place 
in Babylonian and Assyrian theology. Some of 
the literary works which treat of different 
branches of the subject, have been worked out 
with great elaboration. There is one mentioned 
which contains twenty-five books or tablets, and 



THE BLACK ART. 65 

another has more than one hundred. The rules 
adopted for the interpretation of prodigies were 
both abundant and curious. The use of lots ; 
divination by means of arrows and twigs taken 
from sacred trees ; talking trees and singing 
leaA^es; atmospheric phenomena; the flight of 
birds, their cries and sports; clouds, waterspouts, 
winds, lightning, meteors ; presages drawn from 
fire, water, and stones ; signs taken from ser- 
pents, and the peculiarities, external and in- 
ternal, of all animals, and especiallj^ all the cir- 
cumstances connected with the advent into the 
w^orld, both of human beings and of other ani- 
mals ; monstrous forms ; the sun, moon, stars, 
planets, and comets ; dreams and the inspired 
utterances of seers, — from this selection from 
the material presented by the monumental 
records, we may learn how complicated was the 
system. 

The tablets which treat of this subject are for 
the greater part quite fragmentary, and generally 
later than the magic tablets ; but even in their 
imperfect condition, they serve to throw a few 
rays of most welcome light upon an obscure 
subject. 

The Book of Daniel should be read in the 
light of these revelations from beneath the dust 
of ages. It were well also to consult the Book 



66 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

of Ezekiel, and the apocryphal Epistle of Jere- 
mias.* 

We shall learn more of the subject discussed 
in this chapter in the course of the futui-e prog- 
ress of this work. 



* Leuormant, La Diviuation et la Science des Presages cliez 
les Chaldeens ; Les Six Preniiors C'liapitres de Daniel. 



I 



III. 

TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 

N all Semitic art, the gods are represented in 
human form ; only demons and inferior spirits, 
or mythological personages, are portrayed as ani- 
mals or composite figures. Ea alone, as " god of 
life," is given the skin of a fish, which, however, 
he wears only as a cloak. The brood of Chaos, 
depicted in sacred art, and described by Berosus, 
do not belong to the present creation, and dis- 
appear when light is victorious over darkness. 
The god of the Semites is the father of the hu- 
man race, and has created man in his own image. 
Sometimes there is an apotheosis of men, and 
they become gods, though this tendency was early 
checked. 

Naram-Sin, the son of the great Sargon 
of Accad, bore the title of a god, as we learn 
from a haematite cylinder, discovered by General 
Di Cesnola in Cyprus, to which the mighty king 
had extended his conquests. One of the mon- 
archs of Ur, Amar-Agu, or Buru-Sin by name, 
was deified. There is no trace of such apotheo- 
sis later than the time of Khammuragas, though 
a Cassite sovereign, Agu-kak-rime — about B. C. 

67 



68 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

1630 — claimed to have been descended from the 
god Sugamuna. 

But the god had not always been represented 
in human form in Babylonia. It was only when 
the Accadian came in contact with the Semite 
that the tendency to represent the gods in this 
manner — a tendency which had been already 
shown in Chaldsean art — became fully developed, 
The Accadian had represented his gods as ani- 
mals, and when the Semite relegated some of 
these as subordinate spirits to the realm of chaos, 
they were permitted to retain their bestial forms. 

The guardians of Assyrian temples and palaces 
in the forms of Avinged, human-headed bulls and 
lions, and the eagle-headed cherubs which guard 
the sacred tree, are survivals of this old pre- 
Semitism. Frequently, when the gods assumed 
a human form, they were placed by the art of 
the day on the backs of the animals under whose 
forms they had been formerly symbolized. The 
written records which have been preserved to us, 
confirm the testimony of art upon this point. 
The sun-god of Kis is said to have been repre- 
sented as an eagle. These symbols, as survivals, 
appear on Babylonian boundary-stones. 

In the myths concerning Istar and Gizdhubar, 
there are recollections of the time when gods 
were represented as eagles, horses, and lions. 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 60 

'• We are taken back to an epoch of totemism, 
when the tribes and cities of Chaldsea had each 
its totem, or sacred animal, to whom it offered 
divine worship, and who eventually became its 
creator-god." The fish was the totem of Eridii, 
and afterward became the god Ea. The name 
of this god is sometimes expressed by an ideo- 




WINGED I^ION WITH HUMAN H^AD. 

graph which signifies " antelope," and Ea was 
called " the antelope of the deep," "the antelope, 
the creator," " the antelope, the prince," " the 
lusty antelope ;" and the ark, or " ship," in which 
the image of Ea was carried in procession, 
was called " the ship of the divine antelope of 
the deep." 



7 FIRE FR M S TR A NGE AL TA RS. 

Ea may have been the product of the amal- 
gamation of two earlier divinities. The original 
antelope-god may have been the god of the river 
Euphrates, and the fish-god the god of the great 
deep — the Persian Gulf, and later, the encircling 
ocean. Nina — we have the name under different 
forms in different places and times — the serpent- 
goddess, was the daughter of Ea, and had her 
home in the marshes of the river and gulf. As 
Ea was the culture-god, the serpent may in this 
way have been connected with wisdom, as in the 
Genesis account of the temptation of our first 
parents. Merodach, in his war-song, speaks of 
" the strong serpent of the sea," and " the great 
serpent of seven heads." The primitive ser- 
pent-goddess may have been beneficent in char- 
acter, but the Semites made her the very incar- 
nation of wickedness. 

Ea was also at times regarded as a gazelle, 
and was called " the princely gazelle," " the lusty 
gazelle," and "the gazelle who gives the earth," 
and his son Merodach is called "the mighty one 
of the gazelle-god." But the gazelle was more 
usually appropriated to Mul-lil, and hence, we 
may conclude, was the totem of Nipur. 

There was a god Uz, the Accadian word for 
a goat, who, it would seem, was specially adored 
at Nipur. There is evidence which goes to show 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 71 

that the goat was the totem of Sippara, ; at least 
Uz was the title of the local sun-god who was 
there worshiped. " The god Uz himself is de- 
picted as sitting on a throne, watching the revo- 
lution of the solar disk, which is placed upon a 
table and slowly turned by means of a rope. 
He holds in his hand a ring and bolt, and is clad 
in a robe of goat's-skin, the sacred dress of the 
Babylonian priests." 

The pig was once the totem of Nipur, as Adar 
is called " the lord of the swine." The dog was 
connected with Merodach, who, in the later Baby- 
lonian religion, owned four divine hounds. Mer- 
odach may have been originally " the lord of 
death," and his four hounds — " the seizer," " the 
devourer," "the capturer," and "the pursuer" — 
may have been devastating winds. The Semites 
held the pig and the dog in the utmost abhor- 
rence, and the dog is not represented in the early 
Assyrian art. 

Again, Ea and his wife had each two divine 
"bulls." The bulls of Ea were called " the god of 
the field of Eden " and " the god of the house of 
Eden." Merodach, as the sun-god, was " the bull 
of light." The sky was but a duplicate of the 
Babylonian plain, and "the bull of light" was 
the plowman of the celestial fields. 

Taurus, as the zodiacal bull, when the Acca- 



72 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

dian astronomers named the signs, ushered in the 
vernal year. 

In some instances the bestial element was 
eliminated from the old totemistic conceptions. 
As an example, we may cite the case of the 
Accadian Zu, " the divine storm-bird," which be- 
came the god Zu of the Semites. This storm- 
bird was known as Lugal-tudda, " the lusty king," 
and was the patron deity of Marad. He stole 
fire and lightning from heaven, and brought them 
down to earth for the use of man ; as a punish- 
ment, he was driven as an outcast from heaven 
by the great gods. 

"Lugal-tudda (fled) to the mountain, a place remote. 

In the hill of 'Sabu he (dwelt). 

No mother inhabits it and (cares for him). 

No father inhabits it and (associates) with him. 

No priest who knows him (assists him). 

He who (changed) not the resolution, even tlie resolution 

of his heart, 
In his own heart (he kept) his resolution. 
Into the likeness of a bird was he transformed. 
Into the likeness of Zu, the divine storm-bird, was he 

transformed. 
His w^ife uplifts the neck. 
The wife of Zu, the son of Zu, may he cause them to 

dwell in a cage, 
Even the god of the river-reeds (Enua),and the goddess, 

the lady of the basket of river-reeds (Gu-enna) ! 
From his mountain he brought (her), 
As a woman fashioned for a mother made beautiful, 



TEAXSITIOXS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 73 

The goddess of plants, as a woman, fashioned for a mother, 
made beautiful. 



On (his) head he placed a circlet ; 

. . . on his head he set a coronal 

(When) he came from the nest of the god Zu. 

(In a place) unknown in the mountain he made his tomb." 

Here the old story has become a fairy-tale — the 
transformation into a bird has become voluntary, 
in order to secure a beautiful bride. But there 
is no doubt as to the original form of the myth. 
While Zu gazes upon the works of Mul-lil, "he 
sees the crown of his majesty, the clothing of 
his divinity, the tablets of destiny, and Zu him- 
self, and he sees also the father of the gods, the 
bond of heaven and earth. The desire to be Bel 
(Mul-lil) is taken in his heart ; yea, he sees the 
father of the gods, the bond of heaven and earth ; 
the desire to be Bel is. taken in his heart : 'Let 
me seize the tablets of destiny of the gods, and 
the laws of all the gods let me establish ; let my 
throne be set up ; let me seize the oracles ; let me 
urge on the whole of all of them, even the spirits 
of heaven.' So his heart devised opposition ; at 
the entrance to the forest where he was gazing, 
he waited with his head (intent) during the day. 
When Bel pours out the pure, waters, his crown 
was placed on the throne, stripped from (his 



74 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

head.) The tablets of destiny, (Zu) seized with his 
hand ; the attributes of Bel he took ; he delivered 
the oracles. (Then) Zu fled away and sought 
his mountains. He raised a tempest, making (a 
storm)." 

The offended god appeals to several gods of 
the upper court to slay the Babylonian Prome- 
theus, Zu, but none can be prevailed upon to take 
the life of a brother god ; so he abides safe in 
his new mountain home.* 

The divinity revealing himself in the sound of 
the thunder, the storm, and the sea, leads some of 
the Semites to the deification of the voice itself. 
This may also account for the great importance 
attached to names, their proper use, and ac- 
curate pronunciation; and this mystical impor- 
tance assigned to names will assist in the expla- 
nation of the awe and dread in which the curse 
was regarded. When once uttered, the gods 
themselves could not break its power. Mamit 
was the Assyrian god of fate, whose operations, 
like those of the Greek Ate, were usually evil. 
The awfulness of the curse may be learned from 
the incantations used by the early sorcerer. 

" curse, curse the boundary that none can 
pass ! The limit of the gods (themselves) against 
which they may not transgress ! The limit of 

« Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 277-299. 



THANSITIONS AND TRAXSFORMATIONS. 75 

heaven and earth which altereth not ! The unique 
god against whom none may sin ! Neither god 
nor man can undo (it). A snare not to be 
passed through, which is set for evil. Whether 
an evil utuk, or an evil ahi, or an e\i\.ekimnni, 
or an evil c/aliu, or an evil god, or an evil incubus, 
or a lahartu, or a lahatsii, or an aJchkharu, or a 
lihi, or a lilat, or the maid of a lilu, or the evil 
plague-demon, or the disease-bringing asaJchu, or 
a bad sickness, which has set its head towards 
the dropping water of En, may the snare of Ea 
seize it ! Which has stretched its Itead against 
the wisps of Nirba (the corn-god), may' the lasso 
of Nirba bind it! Against the limitation (of the 
curse) it has transgressed. Never may (the 
limitation) of the gods, the limitation of heaven 
and earth, depart from it ! (The limitation of 
the great) gods it reverences not. May (the 
lasso of) the great gods bind it ! May the great 
gods curse it ! May they send back (the demon) 
to (his) home ! The home of (his) habitation 
may they cause him to enter ! As for him who 
has turned to another place, to another place, a 
place invisible, may they bring him ! As for 
him who has turned into the gate of the house, 
the gate of a place from which there is no exit 
may they cause him to enter! As for him who 
has stationed himself in the door and bolts, in 



76 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the door and bolts may they bind him with 
bonds from which there is no release! As for 
him who has blown (?) into the threshold and 
socket, who into threshold and hinge has crept, 
like water may they pour him out, like a 
cup may they shatter him, like quarry-stone 
may they break him to pieces ! As for him 
who has passed across the beam, his wings 
may they cut! As for him who has thrust 
his neck into the chamber, may they twist his 
neck !" * 

As has ' already been stated, these ancient 
peoples believed that diseases were caused by 
demons which, in some way, had been received 
into the human system. But when the disease, 
as a pestilence or an epidemic, swept over a 
w^hole country, there w\as another theory. It 
was then thought to be an instrument in the 
hands of the gods for the punishment of sins. 
Even when the disease attacked only single 
individuals, this solution of the problem was 
sometimes entertained. Namtar, the plague- 
demon, had been the messenger of the gods of the 
under-world and the arbiter of human fate, but 
in Semitic times he became the angel of death 
and acquired divine attributes. He commanded 
the "seven gods," and Itak or Isum in the form 

*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 308. 



TKANSITIOXS AXD TEANSF0R3IATI0XS. il 

of a whirlwind was his messenger. We find also 
Nerra, the god of the dead, rej^resented as the 
master of Isum, and these two divinities became 
the messengers of divine vengeance upon the 
wicked. 

It would appear that the "seven gods" were 
sent as a commission to investigate the sins of the 
people of earth. They found things in a bad state, 
and so reported to Anu, who summoned Nerra, and 
sent him to destroy them" with sword and famine 
and plague. He came to Babylon to execute upon 
that mighty city his stern commission. Mul-lil 
looks down upon the scene, and says in his heart: 

"Nerra is crouching at his gate among the 
corpses of the noble and the slave : Nerra is 
crouching at the gate ; thou hast set his seat 
(there). Their foes have besieged the men of 
Babylon, and thou art their curse. Thou didst 
bind them with chains (?), and didst fix the 
doom (?), warrior Nerra. Thou didst leave 
one and go forth against another. The form of a 
dog dost thou assume and enterest into the 
palace. The people saw thee ; their weapons 
were broken. The heart of the high-priest, 
the avenger of Babylon, is full of valor ; when 
he urged on his troops to take the spoil of the 
enemy, before the people he has done wicked- 
ness. In the city to which I shall send thee 



78 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

thou shalt fear no man, shalt reverence none ; 
small and great slay together, and leave not the 
youngest of the evil race. Thou shalt spoil the 
first that come to Babylon, the people of the 
king which is gathered together and entered into 
the city, shaking the bow and setting up the 
spear, auxilinries who have transgressed against 
Anu and Dagon, thou shalt set up their ^Yeapons; 
like the waters of the storm thou shalt give their 
corpses to the open places of the city; thou 
shalt open their treasures (?) and bid the river 
carry them away." 

It would seem that by the intercession of 
Merodach the wrath of the plague-god was ap- 
peased, and he carried the scourge to Erech. 
From this city he took a more daring flight 
toward the land of the West. "And the war- 
rior Nerra spoke thus : ' Sea-land against sea-, 
land, 'Sumasti against 'Sumasti, the Assyrian 
against the Assyrian, the Elamite against the 
Elamite, the Kosssean against the Kossiiean, the 
Kurd against the Kurd, the Lullubite against the 
Lullubite, country against country, house against 
house, man against man, brother against brother, 
let them destroy one another, and afterwards let 
the Accadian come and slay them all, and fall upon 
their breasts.' The warrior Nerra (further) 
addresses a speech to Isum, who goes before 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 79 

him: 'Go, Isum, incline all thy heart to the 
word thou hast spoken.' (Then) Isum sets his 
face towards the land of the West; the seven 
warrior gods, unequaled, sweep (all things) away 
behind him. At the land of Phoenicia, at the 
mountains, the warrior arrived ; he lifted up the 
hand, he laid it on the mountain ; the mountain 
of Phoenicia he counted as his own soil."* 

Here is a great advance since we first heard 
of the Accadian demon Nam tar, before his char- 
acter was modified by Semitic influence. He 
was the demon of destiny whose power none 
could escape. But Nerra, in some sense his 
decendant, is one of the gods and punishes 
wickedness. He is not unlike the angels of the 
Old Testament whom Jehovah employs for the 
same purpose. We are reminded of the angels 
who were commissioned to visit Sodom and 
behold the iniquity of the inhabitants of the 
cities of the plain. (Genesis xviii, xix.) An 
angel with a drawn sword stood in the way of 
Balaam. (Num. xxi, 22-35.) The angel who 
slew the first-born of the land of Egypt was 
'not far different in character from this old Isum 
of Babylonia. (Exod. xii, 23.) The angel of 
vengeance destroyed seventy thousand of the 

■■■■"Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 311-313; cf. Isaiah 
xixj 2-4, 



80 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

children of Israel, and stretched out his hand 
towards Jerusalem to destroy it, when the Lord 
"repented" and said: "It is enough; now stay 
thine hand." (2 Sam. xxiv, 15, 16.) 

The following is the beginning of the frag- 
ment of an old hymn : 



"(lu) Eridu a stalk grew overshadowing; in a holy place 

did it become green ; 
Its root was of white crystal which stretched towards the 

deep ; 
(Before) Ea was its course in Eridu, teeming with fertility; 
Its seat was the (central) place of the earth ; 
Its foliage was the couch of Zikum (the primaeval) mother. 
Into the heart of its holy house, which spread its shade like 

a forest, hath no man entered. 
(There is the home) of the mighty mother who passes 

across the sky. 
(In) the midst of it was Tanimuz. 
(There is the shrine?) of the two (gods)."* 

No one can avoid recognizing the resemblance 
between this and the world-tree of Norse 
mythology, which we have described in another 
work.f 

The Accadian world-tree extends its roots 
far down into the deepest abyss, stretches its 
trunk through the world of human habitation, 
and lifts its top up to Zikum, the primordial 



■■■■ Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 238. 
t Fradeuburgh, The Gods of our Fathers. 



TRANSITIOXS AXD TRAXSFOR:)rATI0NS. 81 

heavens, who rests upon its outspread branches. 
Within this tree was the temple of Tamniuz and 
Davkina, " the great mother," which was too holy 
for mortal man to enter. This tree in our old 
nursery tale has degenerated into Jack and the 
Bean-stalk. 

Ea describes in a magic text the cure for a 
man possessed of the seven demons. He must 
first go to "the cedar-tree, the tree that shatters 
the power of the incubus, upon whose core the 
name of Ea is recorded." When an augur is 
initiated, he is made to descend into an imitation 
of the lower world, where he beholds " the altars 
amid the waters, the treasuries of Anu, Bel, and 
Ea, the tablets of the gods, the delivering of the 
oracle of heaven and earth, and the cedar-tree, 
the beloved of the great gods, which their hand 
has caused to grow." Another magic text 
directs : " Take the fruit of the cedar, and hold 
it in front of the sick person ; the cedar is the 
tree which gives the pure charm, and repels the 
inimical demons, who lay snares." The cedar 
was much used in medical magic, and a cone of 
the cedar is held in the hand of the eagle-headed 
cherub which guards the sacred tree. This cone 
is also of great importance in other connections. 
This, then, was the world-tree and the tree of life ; 
and having upon its core the name of Ea, the 



82 



FIRE FROM STRANGE AT, TARS. 



god of wisdom, it was also the tree of knowledge. 
We find, however, two sacred trees — the cedar 
and the palm. This may have been a later 
development. The relations of the sacred trees 
of Babylonia with the sacred trees of other 
nations and religions would open too large a 
subject for the present discussion. * 

The conventional forms of the sacred trees in 
Assyrian art effectually con- 
ceal their species. Doubtless 
"the tree of life" and ".the 
tree of the knowledge of good 
and evil" were conceived by 
the author of Genesis under 
similar forms. 

The primitive ChakUean had 
little knowledge concerning a 
future life. The horizon of his 
hopes was bounded by the pres- 
ent world. According to the theology of Nipur, 
Mul-lil ruled over the ghost-world — a gloomy 
realm beneath the earth. Here the Anunas, the 
spirits of earth, had their golden throne, and 
guarded the waters of life. The cult of Eridu 
made the great ocean-stream the home of the gods. 
When the two cults were united, the under-world of 




The Tree of Life. 



*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887 
Beginnings of History, pp. 92, 93. 



pp. 240-242 ; Lenormant, 



TEANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 83 

Nipur was connected with this ocean-stream, and it 
became the entrance to Hades. The ghost-world 
and the world of Ea were identified and con- 
founded; there was, however, this distinction — 
that the ghosts remained in the under-world, 
while Mul-lil dwelt in the world above with Ea 
and Merodach. Since the sacred river and the 
Persian Gulf were identified with the ocean- 
stream, the world of the gods was thought to be 
situated somewhere beyond the mouth of. the 
Euphrates. 

We meet with another and different concep- 
tion in Kharsag-Kurkura^" the mountain of the 
world" — which became the Assyrian Olympus. 
This mountain was placed in the far north, and 
seemed to correspond with the world-tree. Its 
roots were deep down in the abyss, and its sum- 
mit high up in the world of the immortal gods. 
It drew another Hades and another Paradise to 
the north.* A Babylonian hymn begins : 

"0 mighty mountain of Mul-lil, Im-Kharsag (the mount- 
ain sky), whose head rivals the heavens; the pure 
deep has been laid as its foundation. 

Among the mountains it lies like a strong wild bull. 

Its horns glisten like the splendor of the Sun-god. 

Like the star of heaven that proclaims (the day), it is full 
of glistering rays. 



"■■■ Cf . Isaiah xiv, 13. 



84 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

The mighty mother, Niu-lilli (the lady of the ghost-world), 
tlie reverence of E-Sdra (the temple of the hosts of 
heaven), the glory of E-Kiira (the temple of the hosts 
of earth), the adornment of P]-Gigiina (the temple of 
the city of darkness), the heart of E-Ki-gusiira (the 
temple of the land of light)." ='- 

This mountain became the ladder by which to 
ascend to the home of the gods ; while far above 
was the highest heaven — " the heaven of Ann." 
Hades was still a dark and dreary land beneath 
the earth, where the spirits of the dead flit, eat 
dust and drink mud, and from which they some- 
times escape, and, as vampires, feed upon the 
blood of living men. The road to this gloomy 
realm leads through the seven gates, whose por- 
ters strip the dead of all his trappings and apparel, 
and guard against his return to the upper air. 
There are neither rewards nor punishments in 
this dark abode, and there is the recognition of 
neither vice nor virtue. It is all unsubstantial, 
shadowy, and unreal. 

There are, however, the beginnings of a nobler 
and purer doctrine. 

" Wash thy hands, purify thy hands. 

Let the gods, thine elders, wash their hands, purify their 

hands. 
Eat sacred food from sacred plates. 



*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 3G2. 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 85 

Drink sacred water from sacred vessels. 
Prepare thyself for the judgment of the king of the son of 
his god," 

" They have put there the sacred water. 

The goddess Auat, the great spouse of Ann, 

Will cover thee with her sacred hands. 

The God lau will transport thee into a place of delights. 

He will transport thee into a place of delights. 

He \Yill place thee in the midst of honey and butter. 

He will pour into thy mouth reviving water; 

Thy mouth will be opened for thanksgivings." 

" On a couch reclining, and 

Pure water he drinks. 

Who in the battle was slain she sees. 

His father and his mother his head support ; 

His wife weeps much. 

Those who are his friends on the ground stand round. 

She sees, and thou shalt see. 

His spoil on the ground he does not regard. 

Of his spoil an account he has not. 

The captives assemble and follow food, 

Which in the tents are eaten."* 

There may have been a worship of the mount- 
ains among the Accadians before they left their 
home in the East to settle as colonists in Chal- 
dsea. The mountains were not only the altars of 
the gods, but were themselves also sometimes 
considered divine, or the visible habitations of 



*Halevy, Records of the Past, Vol. XI, pp. 161, 162; 
Boscawen, Vol. IX, p. 134. 



86 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the divinities of the air. The temple mounds of 
Babylonia may occupy the places of older sanc- 
tuaries, around which clustered many sacred asso- 
ciations. It is quite suitable that in this land the 
people should have conceived the idea of building 
a tower, the summit of which should be so high 
that the gods would make it their peculiar resi- 
dence. The monuments refer to this work, and 
to the confounding of the secret counsels of the 
people, so that they were compelled to abandon 
their purpose. 

The great astronomical work — " The Observa- 
tions of Bel" — proves that the heavens were 
studied in early Chaldsean times. The Assyrian 
religion, in its full development, was decidedly 
sidereal. The gods of the Pantheon were iden- 
tified with planets, and the stars — as well as the 
sun, moon, and comets — were deified; thus as- 
suming a double character, mythological and 
sidereal. 

The sun had different names — as in Egypt, 
in the morning, in the evening, and at midday — 
" the sun of life," " the god of death," and " the 
Southern sun." The same cuneiform character, 
whose phonetic value is an, means both star and 
deity. Merodach, " the circle of the sun," is Mer- 
cury as the morning star, and Jupiter as the 
evening star, and is called by different names 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 87 

throughout all the months of the year — "the 
messenger of the rising sun," "the light of the 
heavenly spark," and so on. The moon is called 
"the star of Anunit," and "the star of the Ti- 
gris." Venus is " the proclaimer of the coming 
sun," and " the lady of the defenses of heaven." 
Saturn is " the eldest-born of the sun-god." 
Jupiter is identified with several stars, as "the 
star of Merodach," and " the flame of the desert;" 
and Mars is " the star of the seven names." The 
stars are called "judges," and the pole-star is 
"the judge of heaven." The colors of the gar- 
ments of the ChaldjTean priests seem to have been 
symbolical of the heavenly bodies to whose wor- 
ship they were devoted. Red symbolizes Mars; 
blue, Mercury ; and pale yellow, Venus. The 
study of the stars became an imperative relig- 
ious duty. 

The Assyrians possessed a regular ritual and 
rubric. Each day of the year was assigned to a 
special deity or patron saint, and special services 
and ceremonies were observed. In an Accadian 
calendar, sacred services are prescribed in honor 
of twenty gods. On certain Sabbath days — the 
seventh, fourteenth, twenty-first, twenty-eighth, 
fis well as the nineteenth of each month — the 
flesh of birds and cooked fruits could not be 
eaten, garments could not be changed, and white 



88 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

robes could not be worn. The king was forbid- 
den to ride in his chariot. No laws could be 
made, no military commands issued, and no med- 
icine taken. The word S'abattu, " a day of rest 
for the heart," remains. There was also a day 
called the " day of joy." Each month also w\as 
dedicated to a special god.* 

" Though religious uniformity is certainly not 
the law of the empire, yet a religious character 
appears in many of the wars, and attempts seem 
to be made at least to diffuse everywhere a knowl- 
edge and recognition of the gods of Assyria." 

" In every way religion seems to hold a 
marked and prominent place in the thoughts of 
th« people, who fight more for the honor of 
their gods than even of their king, and aim at 
extending their belief as much as their do- 
minion. "f 

Kings are responsible to the gods, and must 
rule in righteousness. The inscriptions, even 
those most strictly historic, begin and end with 
prayer and praise to the principal deities, while 
Babylonian inscriptions largely concern the erec- 
tion and repairing of temples. Altars are called 



■Lenormant, Bt'giunings of History, pp. 2-i8 ct aeq. ; Saycc, 
Kecords of the Past, Vol. VII, pp. 155-170. 

t Rawliiison's Herodotus, Vol. I, p. 398 ; Auc^ient Mou- 
arcliios. Vol. I, p. 241, 



TEANSITIONS AXD TRANSFORMATIONS. 89 

" the foot-stools of the great gods." Proper 
names frequently contain, as elements, the names 
of one or more gods. 

Nebuchadnezzar is high-priest of Merodach. 
Nebo is " the bestower of thrones in heaven and 
earth." Sennacherib introduces the Assyrian 
religion in conquered countries, and several kings 
have been raised to the rank of deities. Law- 
suits are held in temples. Assurbanipal causes 
the kings whom he conquers to swear '• to wor- 
ship the great gods." Success in war or in the 
chase is ascribed to the help of the guardian 
deities. Esarhaddon prays at the dedication of 
a temple that " the bull of good fortune may 
never cease to watch over it ;" and he erects 
many statues and altars to the great gods. " The 
god Sin shone on the top of the temples and 
shadowed the battlements." Nabonidus erects a 
temple to the moon — " king of the stars upon 
stars " — in the city of Ur, and prays : " The king 
of the great divinity in the hearts of their inhab- 
itants fix thou firmly, that they may not trans- 
gress against thy divinity !" " Fix thou firmly 
in his heart that he may never fall into sin." 
Tiglath-Pileser I dedicates twenty-five captured 
gods "for the honor of the temple of the queen 
of glory." He prays Anu and Rimmon to sup- 
port the men of his government, establish the 



90 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

authority of his officers, send refreshing rain, 
give victory in battle, and reduce hostile kings 
and keep them in allegiance to his successors. 
He desires to worship " honestly, with a good 
heart and pure trust." 

In B. C. 2280, a powerful king of Elam, Ku- 
dur-Nankhunte by name, ravaged the city of 
Erech, and carried the image of Istar away to 
Susa. After 1635 years, this same image was 
recaptured and restored by Assurbanipal. Sar- 
gon sacrificed "pure victims, supreme sacrifices, 
expiatory holocausts," and offered frankincense, 
vases of glass, chiseled objects in pure silver, 
heavy jewels, " sculptured bulls, winged quadru- 
peds, reptiles, fishes, and birds, symbols of abun- 
dance of an incomparable fecundity." Tablets and 
cylinders, with important inscriptions, were de- 
posited in the foundation-stones of buildings.* 

It will be observed that our knowledge of the 
religion of the Assyrians is confined largely to 
the court. The religion of the common people 
was doubtless more corrupt by connection with 
elemental worship and magic. 

Sacred texts, talismans, and amulets retained 
their supposed efficacy in the later faith. San- 



* Various translators, Records of the Past, Vols. XI, p. 
20; V, J). 123; T, p. 27; V, p. 9G; III, pp. 115, 123; XI, p. 33 
et seq.; V, pp. 14G-14S, 15, 25, 2G ; III, p. 55; I, p. 29. 



TRANSITIONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 91 

duarri, king of Kundi and Sitzu, who contended 
against Esarhaddon, wrote the names of " the 
great gods side by side," and trusted in the 
power of this charm. Images of the gods and 
holy texts were placed on the door-posts, to pro- 
tect the inmates of the house from disease. Sa- 
cred texts were sometimes bound about the 
statues of the gods, or around the head of the sick. 

Criminals were thrown into a furnace, or den 
of lions, or among wild beasts. The Book of 
Daniel is powerfully confirmed in every partic- 
ular. The Scripture estimate of the character 
of the Assyrians is fully confirmed by the mon- 
uments, and their city was indeed " a bloody 
city." (Isaiah xxxiii, 19 ; Nah. iii, 1.) They are 
violent and treacherous and covenant-breakers, 
who " despise the cities and regard no man." 
Their pride calls down upon them the Divine 
wrath. (Isaiah x, 7-14 ; xxxiii, 1, 8 ; Ezek. xxxi, 
10, 11; Zeph. ii, 15; Isaiah xxxvii, 24-28.) 
Their national emblem was a lion, that " tears in 
pieces enough for his whelps, and strangles for 
his lions, and fills his holes with prey and his 
dens with raven." When Nineveh repented, 
under the preaching of Jonah, it was by turn- 
ing from evil and violence, (Nah. ii, 11-13 ; 
Jonah iii, 8.) 

Certain passages from the monuments may be 



92 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

compared with similar passages from the Holy 
Scriptures: "Who can compare with thee, 
Ninip, son of Bel ? Thou didst not stretch forth 
thy hand (in vain). ... thou! thy 
words, who can learn ? Who can rival them ? 
Among the gods, thy brothers, thou hast no 
equal. . , . In heaven, who is great? Thou 
alone art great! On earth, who is great? Thou 
alone art great ! When thy voice resounds on 
heaven, the gods fall prostrate. When thy 
voice resounds on earth, the genii kiss the 
dust. . . . Keep thou the door of my lips ! 
Guard thou my hands, lord of light! sun, 
to the lifting up of my hands (in prayer) show 
favor! . . , my God, my sins are seven 
times seven! . . . Before his god in prayer 
he fell flat on his face." These passages might 
be greatly multiplied. 

Self-mutilation seems to have been considered 
especially praiseworthy. "He who stabs his 
flesh in honor of Ishtar, the goddess unrivaled, 
like the stars of heaven he shall shine; like the 
river of might he shall flow." We meet also 
with the belief that sins may be inherited from 
the parents, and may be imputed from an elder 
brother, or even from some unknown person. 

Throughout the East the protecting divine 
power is regularly represented in ancient art as 



TBANSITTONS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 98 

;i circle or disk, with long wings on each side. 
The winged disk hovers over the king of Nin- 
eveh as he goes forth to battle. In the earlier 
art the wings extend from a simple circle or 
disk, but in later art the circle is modified so as 
to represent the Divine Person. Sometimes 
there is also a head over each wing, forming, 
with the central figure, a Divine Triad. In the 
Assyrian sculptures the king is often represented 
kneeling in worship under the winged disk, and 
receiving in his hands two healing streams from 
the outstretched wings. Sacred writers have 
made use of this grandest of figures to give 
strength and comfort to him who believes in the 
love and protection of God. 

"But unto you that fear my name, shall the 
Son of righteousness arise with healing in his 
wings." " The Lord recompense thy work, and 
a full reward be given thee of the Lord God of 
Israel, under whose wings thou art come to 
trust." "He shall cover thee with his feathers, 
and under his wings shalt thou trust." " I will 
trust in the covert of thy wings." "Hide me 
under the shadow of thy wings." " In the shadow 
of thy wings will I rejoice." (Psalms xvii, 8 ; 
Ixi, 4 ; Ixiii, 7 ; xci, 4.) 

If there was ever an ancient monotheism in 
Assyria, it was early overgrown by polytheism. 



H FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

" When we penetrate through the gross surface 
of polytheism, which it had acf^uired from pop- 
ular superstition, and revert to the original and 
higher conceptions, we shall find the whole based 
on the idea of the unity of the Deity, the last 
relic of the primitive revelation disfigured by and 
lost in the monstrous ideas of pantheism, con- 
founding the creature Avith the Creator, and 
transforming the Deity into a god-world, whose 
manifestations are to be found in all the phe- 
nomena of nature." "In truth, polytheism was 
stamped on the earth in temples and towns, 
and the warlike or beneficent works of kings. 
Rimmon was the patron of the all-important irri- 
gation; Sin, of brick-making and building; Ner- 
gal, of war. Polytheism glittered in scrolls of 
light in the constellations of the firmament ; it 
measured days and months, and years and cycles, 
and, by its auguries of good or ill, decided the 
least ways of house-life and the greatest collisions 
of nations."* 



*Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. I, p. 450; 
Tomkins, Studies on the Times of Abraham, p. 12. 



IV. 

GODS AND NO-GODS. 



PART FIRST. 



^pHROUCxHOUT Chald^ea the spirit of the 
jL sky received worship from the earliest 
times; but in Erech, Ana became the chief deity 
of the local cult, and the importance of his city 
gave him the first place in the Semitic triad of 
gods, when our real acquaintance with him be- 
gins. His influence earl 3^ extended to the west; 
for in the time of Thotraes III his name and 
that of Anat, his double, were known in Pales- 
tine. The original Ana was the visible sky; the 
Semitic Anu was a spiritual divinity, who reigned 
in a spiritual heaven far above the visible sky. 
Afterward he became the lord and father of the 
universe, and still later a pantheistic god, or the 
universe itself. Sometimes Anu is called " the 
one god," but this is to be taken in a pantheistic 
sense. His sign was a star, or a symbol resem- 
bling a Maltese cross, which was often worn round 
the necks of Chaldsean kings. He seems never 
to have reached the importance of many other 
gods, since only Tiglath-Pileser I was his special 

95 



96 FIRE FR OM STRA NGE A L TA RS. 

votary, and even he was more devoted to Assur. 
When the whole universe was divided into two 
regions, Anu was heaven, and Aiiat was the 
earth. 

Mul-lil was primarily the local deity of Nipur. 
The word signifies " the lord of the ghost-world." 
Lil was an old Accado-Sumerian word, and de- 
noted " cloud of dust." The Arabian Lilith, ac- 
cording to the cabalistic rabbis, was said to have 
been the first wife of Adam, whom she deceived 
by taking the form of a woman. She had seven 
hundred and eighty-four children — all demons. 
She was also the daughter of impurity. Upon 
the birth of the first child, it was the custom of 
Arabian nurses to throw stones at the foot of the 
bed to drive away Lilith. " The wild beasts of 
the desert shall also meet the wild beasts of the 
island, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow ; the 
screech-owl " — Lilith, or demon of darkness — 
" shall rest there, and find for herself a place of 
rest." (Isaiah xxxiv, 14.) 

Mul-lil was also " the lord of the world " and 
" king of all the spirits of the earth." When he 
became the supreme sun-god of the Semites, 
under the name of Bel — either the beneficent sun 
who gives life and light, or the malevolent sun 
who burns and scorches — he retained his primi- 
tive attributes, but assumed other attributes 



GODS A NT) NO-GODS. 97 

suited to his new character. Bel was repre- 
sented as a king, wearing a tiara crested with 
bulls horns, and holding a scepter as an emblem 
of power. The astronomical work of Sargon of 
Accad w\as called '' Observations of Bel," and 
Assyria was called " The Empire of Bel." 

The wife of the primaeval god was Ninkigal, 
the queen of Hades, Avho was also known as Nin- 
lil, " the lady of the ghost-world." Assurbanipal 
addresses her as " the mistress of the world, 
whose habitation is the temple of the library." 
In the Semitic texts she is named Allat, and it 
is with this goddess that Istar had sad experi- 
ence upon the occasion of her descent into the 
realm of shades. 

Namtar, the plague-demon, was the " beloved 
son" of Bel, and demons, nightmares, and dis- 
eases were his messengers. "The older Bel" 
was not always distinguished from " the younger 
Bel" of Babylon. 

"It is thus clear that, just as Eridu in south- 
ern Babylonia was the primitive seat of the wor- 
ship of the Chaldsean culture-god and of the 
civilization with which his name was connected, 
Nipur in Northern Babylonia was the original 
home of a very different kind of worship, which 
concerned itself with ghosts and demons and the 
various monsters of the under-world. It was, in 
9 



98 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

fact, the home of that belief in magic, and in the 
various spirits exorcised by the magician, which 
left so deep an impression upon the religion of 
early Babylonia. . . . The analogy of Eridu 
would lead us to infer, moreover, that it was- not 
only the home of this belief, but also the source 
from which it made its way to other parts of the 
country. In the pre-historic age, Eridu in the 
south and Nipur in the north would have been 
the two religious centers of Babylonian theology, 
from whence two wholly different streams of 
religious thought and influence spread and event- 
ually blended. The mixture formed what I may 
call the established religion of Chaldsea in the 
pre-Semitic period."* 

Berosus, according to Alexander Polyhistor, 
declares that, at the first, the representatives of 
the various nations settled at Babylon lived 
without rule and order, like the beasts of the 
field. 

"In the first year there made its appearance, 
from a part of the Erythraean Sea which bordered 
upon Babylonia, an animal endowed with reason, 
who was called Oannes. (According to the ac- 
count of Apollodorus) the whole body of the an- 
imal was like that of a fish, and had under a 
fish's head another head, and also feet below, 

Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 150, 151. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 99 

similar to those of a man, subjoined to the fish's 
tail. His voice, too, and language, was articulate 
and human ; and a representation of him is pre- 
served to this day. 

" This being, in the day-time, used to converse 
with men, but took no food at that season; and 
he gave them an insight into letters and sciences 
and every kind of art. He taught them to con- 
struct houses, to found temples, to compile laws, 
and explained to them the principles of geomet- 
rical knowledge. He made them distinguish the 
seeds of the earth, and showed them how to col- 
lect fruits. In short, he instructed them in every- 
thing which could tend to soften manners and 
humanize mankind. From that time, so uni- 
versal were his instructions, nothing material has 
been added by way of improvement. When the 
sun set, it was the custom of this being to plunge 
again into the sea, and abide all night in the 
deep ; for he was amphibious. . . . More- 
over, Oannes wrote concerning the generation of 
mankind, of their different ways of life, and of 
their civil polity."* 

Other animals like Oannes are said to have 
appeared, but our information concerning them is 
confined to a knowledge of some of the names 
which old writers have preserved. 

"*Cory, Ancient Fragments, pp. 57, 58. 



100 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

In a bilingual reading-book, compiled for the 
use of Semitic students of Accadian, we have 
what may be received as a native fragment of 
this legend : 

"To the waters their god has returned; 
luto the house of (his) repose the protector descended. 
The wicked weaves spells, but the sentient one grows not 
. . old. 

A wise people repeated his wisdom. 
The unwise, and the slave the most valued of his master, 

forgot him. 
There was need of him, and he restored (his) de- 
crees (?)."* 

Whatever may be the etymology of the w^ord 
Oannes, it is certain that the being of whom we 
have this description is the same as the culture- 
god Ea, wdio had Ids home in the Persian Gulf, 
Mud was the god of wisdom, and instructed the 
people in the arts and sciences. Both were rep- 
resented as part man and part fish, and both were 
called "the god of pure life." 

The word Ea, signifies " belonging to a house," 
and hence originally Ea must have been a '"house- 
god." He was symbolized by a serjient. The 
primitive seat of his worship was the city of 
Eridu, on the eastern bank of the Eujihrates — 
now represented by the mounds of Al)u Sliah- 



Sayce. Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 132. 



GODS AXD NO-GODS. 101 

rein, south of Mugheir, or Ur. Eiidu was a holy 
city, and the center of the early culture and civ- 
ilization of Babylonia. There is evidence that 
Eridu and Ur maintained commercial relations 
b}^ water with the Sinaitic Peninsula on the one 
side and the western coast of India on the other 
side, at a period which Snyce places at from three 
to four thousand years before the Christian era. 

This water-god is addressed ns "lord of the 
earth," "lord of heaven and earth," "the master 
of all created things," "the ruler of all the 
world," "the god of the universe," and "the 
prince of the zenith." His consort Davkina, or 
Davki, "the lady of the earth," possessed powers 
co-extensive with his own. The old inhabitants 
of Eridu believed the world to have been formed 
out of these two elements, water and earth — Ea 
and Davkina. Ea was the demiurge of the 
south, as Bel was the demiurge of the north. 

Ea was invoked as the god "who stretches 
out the bright firmament; the god of good winds; 
the lord of hearing and obedience; creator of the 
pure and the impure; establisher of fertility, who 
brings to greatness him that is of small estate. 
In places difficult of access we have smelt his 
good wind. May he command, may he glorify, 
may he hearken to his worshipers ! god of 
the pure crown, moreover, may all creatures that 



102 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

have wings and fins be strong! Lord of the pure 
oracle, who giveth life to the dead, who hath 
granted forgiveness to the conspiring gods, hath 
laid homage and submission upon the gods his foes. 
For their redemption did he create mankind, 
even he the merciful one with whom is life. 
May he establish, and never nuiy his word be 
forgotten in the mouth of the black-headed race 
(of Sumir), whom his hands created ! As god 
of the pure incantation, may he further be in- 
voked, before whose pure approach may the evil 
trouble be overthrown, by whose pure spell the 
siege of the foe is removed ! god, who know- 
est the heart, who knowest the hearts of the 
gods that move his compassion, so that they let 
not the doing of evil come forth agninst him; he 
who est.-iblishes the assembly of the gods (and 
knows) their hearts, who subdues the disobe- 
dient. . . . May he (determine) the courses 
of the stars of heaven; like a flock may he order 
all the gods! May he exorcise the sea-monster 
of chaos ; her secrets may he discover (?) and 
destroy for evermore ! Mankind may he raise to 
length of days, and may he overthrow mischief (?) 
for future time! Since (their) places he created, 
he fashioned, he made strong, lord of the world 
is he called by name, even Father Bel. The 
names of the anerels he urave unto them. And 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 103 

Ea heard, and his liver was soothed, and he 
spake thus : ' Since he has made his men strong 
by his name, let him, like myself, have the name 
of Ea. May he bear (to them) the bond of all 
my commands, and may he communicate all my 
secret knowledge through the fifty names of the 
great gods!' His fifty names he has pronounced, 
his ways he has restored ; may they be observed, 
and may he speak as formerlj^ ! Wise and sen- 
tient, may he rule triumphantly ! May father to 
son repeat and hand them down ! May he open 
the ears of both shepherd and flock!"* 

It is interesting to remark in this hymn that 
the creation of the human race and the resurrec- 
tion of the dead are ascribed to Ea. In the an- 
cient Babylonian religion mankind are not de- 
scended from the god, as in so many other theolo- 
gies, but are emphatically his creation. Through 
Davkina, the oracles of Ea were communicated to 
men, and she is entitled " the mistress of the 
oracular voice of the deep," and "the lady who 
creates the oracular voice of heaven." She is the 
goddess of the earth, and of the sky, which was 
considered as another earth ; and Ea is the watery 
abyss beneath the earth and the watery abyss 
above the sky, "the waters above the firma- 
ment." Dumuzi, or Tammuz, " the only begotten 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 140, 141. 



104 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

one," the sun-god, is the offspring of Ea and 
Davkina. 

This god of the abyss possessed the attri- 
butes of several classical divinities. Like Hades, 
he was lord of the lower regions, and his spouse 
was "the lady of the great land, the lady of the 
house of death." Like Poseidon, he was "lord 
of the abyss," "lord of fountains," and "lord of 
sailors." He taught the Chaldtean Noah how to 
build the ark and sail over the waters of the 
Flood. He had dominion over various spirits of 
the deep, and was associated with the goddess 
Bahu, " the void," also called Gula. Like Hermes, 
he was " the god who knows all things, lord of 
wisdom, mines, treasures, gifts, and music, and 
the lord of the bright eye."* 

Such are the gods which form the first triad — 
Ana, Mul-lil, and Ea, of the early Chaldiean the- 
ology, developed under Semitic influence into 
Anu, Bel, and Ea. 

The chief seat of the worship of the moon-god 
was Ur, now represented by the mounds of Mug- 
heir, where he had a great temple and was wor- 
shiped with imposing ceremonies. He was also 
called Nanak or Nannar, " the bright one," whence 
the classical legend of Nannarus. He was " the 
first-born of Mul-lil," and "the father of the 



« Talbot, Records of the Past, Vol. V, p. 1G5. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 105 

gods," and was raised to the highest pLice in 
the Babylonian pantheon by the old astronomers 
of Chaldpea. Each Babylonian town had its own 
local moon-god, but the importance of the city of 
Ur made the special moon-god worshiped there 




UR OF THE CHALDEES. 

the god of all. On the other hand, all purely 
Semitic religions make the sun-god supreme. 

We present a hymn — Accadian, with a Semitic 
translation — from the great library of Assur- 
banipal. Abraham may have often listened to 
this hymn while he was yet a resident of " Ur 
of the Chaldees." 

"Lord and prince of the gods, who in heaven and earth 

alone is supreme ! 
Father Nannar, lord of the firmament, prince of the gods ! 



106 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Father Nannar, lord of heaveu, luighly cue, prince of the 

gods ! 
Father Nauuar, lord of the moon, prince of tlie gods! 
Father Nannar, lord of Ur, prince of the gods ! 
Father Nannar, lord of the temple of the niighty Light, 

prince of the gods ! 
Father Nannar, who biddest the crowned disk to rise, prince 

of the gods ! 
Father Nannar, who makest the crowned disk fully perfect, 

prince of the gods ! 
Father Nannar, who sweeps away with a blow invincil)le, 

prince of the gods ! 
Strong Ox, whose horn is powerful, whose limbs are perfect, 

whose beard is of crystal . . . 

Merciful one, begetter of the universe, wlio founds (his) 

illustrious seat among living creatures ! 
Father, long-suffering and full of forgiveness, whose hand 

upholds the life of all mankind ! 
Lord, thy divinity like the far-off" heaveu fills the wide sea 

Avith fear. 
On the surface of the peopled earth he bids the sanctuary 

be placed, he proclaims their name. 
Father, begetter of gods and men, who causes the shrine to 

be founded, who establishes the offering. 
Who proclaims dominion, who gives the scepter, who shall 

fix destiny unto a distant day. 
First-born, omnipotent, whose heart is immensity, and 

there is none who may discover it. 
Firm are his limbs (?); his knees rest not ; he opens the 

path of the gods his brethren. 
(He is the god) who makes the light from the horizon to 

the zenith of heaven, opening wide the doors of the 

sky, and establishing light (in the world). 



GODS AXD NO-GODS. 107 

Father, begetter of the universe, illuaiiuator of Hviug 

beings . . . sender of . . . 
Lord, the ordainer of the laws of heaven and earth, whose 

command may not be (broken) ; 
Thou boldest the rain and the lightning, defender of all 

living tbiugs; there is no god who hath at any time 

discovered thy fullness. 
In heaven who is supreme? Thou alone, thou art su- 
preme. 
On eartb who is supreme ? Tbou alone, thou art supreme. 
As for thee, thy will is made known in heaven, and the 

angels bow their faces. 
As for tbee, thy will is made known upon eartli, and the 

spirits below kiss the ground. 
As f )r thee, thy will is blown on high like tbe wind ; the 

stall and the fold are quickened. 
As for thee, thy will is done upon the earth, and the herb 

grows green. 
As for thee, thy will is seen in the lair and the shepherd's 

hut ; it increases all living things. 
As for thee, thy will hath created law and justice, so that 

mankind has established \a,w. 
As for thee, thy will is the far-off heaven, the hiddden 

earth which no man hath known. 
As for thee, who can learn thy w-ill, who can rival it? 
O lord, in heaven (is thy) lordship, in the earth (is thy) 

sovereignty ; among the gods, thy brethren, a rival 

thou hast not. 
King of kings, of whose ... no man is judge, whose 

divinity no god resembles. 

Look with favor on thy temple ! 

Look with favor on Ur (thy city); 

Let the high-born dame ask ;:est of thee, O lord ! 



108 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Let the free-born man, the . . , ask rest of thee, O lord! 
Let the spirits of heaven and earth (ask rest of thee), O 
lord !" * 

The priesthood and population of Ur seem 
to have come from Nipur rather than from Eridu. 
The moon-god of Ur, with the growth of the city, 
absorbed the local cults, and from Ur as a center 
extended his influence far and wide. lie iiad 
temples, not only at Ur, but also at B.-ibylon, 
Borsippa, Calah, and Dur-Sargina; and his temple 
at Haran even rivaled that at Ur. With the 
growth of the Semitic power in Babylonia, he 
received the name of Sin. The n.-ime is found 
in Southern Arabia; Siu;d may mean '-'dedicated 
to Sin;" and we have "the wilderness of Sin." 

Nabonidus repaired the temple of Sin at 
Haran, re-dedicated it, and prayed : 

"May the gods who dwell in heaven and 
earth approach the house of Sin, the father 
who created them? As for me, Nabonidus, king 
of Babylon, the completer of this temple, may 
Sin, the king of the gods of heaven and earth, 
in the lifting up of his kingly eyes, with joy 
look upon me, month by month, at noon and sun- 
set 1 May he grant me favorable tokens, may he 
lengthen my days, may he extend my years, 



*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 160-162; cf. translation 
in Tomkius, Studies on the Times of Abraham, pp. 9, 10. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 109 

may he establish my reign, may he overcome my 
foes, may he slay my enemies, may he sweep 
away my opponents ! May Nin-gal, the mother 
of the mighty gods, in the presence of Sin, her 
loved one, speak like a mother ! May Samas and 
Istar, the bright offspring of his heart, to Sin, 
the father who begat them, speak of blessing! 
Nuzku, the messenger supreme, hearken to my 
prayer and plead for me !" * 

Larsa was near Ur, but on the opposite bank 
of the Euphrates, and had a famous temple from 
the earliest times, dedicated to the sun-god of 
whom the moon-god is especially the father. 
Additional weight is given to this opinion by the 
fact that Ur-Bagas, the first monarch of united 
Babylonia of whom we have a record, founded 
or restored the temple of Sin at Ur, and also the 
temples of the sun-god at Larsa, of Mul-lil at 
Nipur, and of Anu and Istar at Erech. Ur was 
at that time the metropolis of the whole region. 
With the rise of the Semite, the name of the 
god of Larsa was merged into the general name 
Samas, " the sun," the " Shemesh " of the Bible, f 

Bat Sippara was emphatically the city of the 
worship of the sun-god whose temple fi-Babara, 
"the house of luster," outshone all others in 



*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 165. 
1 1 Sam, V, 9. 



110 FIR E FR OM STRANGE A L TA RS. 

early historic times, and gave to the city pre- 
eminent importance. The Bible mentions Se- 
pharvaim, ''the two Sipparas," one of which is 
now represented by the mounds of Abu Hubba, 
discovered by Hormuzd liassam, and the other 
has been discovered by Dr. Ward in the mounds 
of Anbar. Agade or Accad — it may have been 
one of the several Sipparas, which are known to 
have existed — near these cities of the sun, was 
founded or restored by the first Sargon, and rose 
to such prominence as to give its name to the 
whole of Babylonia. Here Sargon established a 
library, which became so celebrated that the 
district was known as " the region of books." 
Popular etymology connected Sippara v\rith Sepher, 
"a book;" and in the fragments of Berosus the 
city was named Pantibiblia, "Book-town." The 
new Samas of Sippara is Semitic, and the hymns 
addressed to him are full of Semitic thought : 

" Lord, illumiDator of the darkness, opener of the sickly face, 

Merciful god,\vhosetteth up the fallen, who helpeth the weak, 

Unto thy light look the great gods. 

The spirits of earth all gaze upon thy face ; 

The language of hosts as one word thou directest; 

Smiting their head, they look to the light of the midday sun. 

Like a wife, art tliou set, glad and ghvddening. 

Thou art the light in the vault of the far-off heaven. 

Thou art the spectacle of the broad earth. 

Men far and near behold thee and rejoice. 

Tiie great gods have smelt the sweet savor (of the sacrifice), 



GODS AND XO-GODS. Ill 

The food of the shining heaven, the blessings (of the gods). 
He who has not turned his hand to sin (thou wilt prosper), 
He shall eat thy food, (he shall be blessed by thee.)"* 

Nabonidus, restoring his temple, prayed : 
'•0 Samas, (mighty lord) of heaven and earth, 
light of the gods his fathers, offspring of Siii and 
Nin-gal, when thou enterest into E-Babara, the 
temple of thy choice, when thou iniiabitest thy 
everlasting shrine, look with joy upon me, 
Nabonidus, the king of Babylon, the prince who 
has fed thee, who has done good to thy heart, 
who has built thy dwelling place supreme, 
and upon my prosperous labors ; and daily at 
noon and sunset, in heaven and earth, grant me 
favorable omens, receive my prayers, and listen 
to my supplications. May I be lord of the 
firmly-established scepter and sword, which thou 
hast given my hands to hold, for ever and ever !"-j 
The local sun-gods, when not designated bj 
different names, were either absorbed by Samas 
or they became his sons. The absence of marks 
of gender in the Accadian language occasioned a 
difficulty when the Semite came to adopt the 
old gods. Among the Accadians the mother 
stood at the head of the family, and the god- 
desses of Accad were independent deities and in 



*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 171. 
tibid., p. 174. 



112 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

all respects equal with the gods. Among the 
Semites distinctions of gender were all-important. 
The father was the head of the family, and the 
gods were the real divinities, each, however, 
requiring, by an almost grammatical necessity, his 
female counterpart. Hence the female divinities 
were but pale reflections of their male consorts — 
their " faces," or complements. The old Accadian 
sun-god A was adopted ; but, in the confusion 
occasioned by the lack of marks in the language 
to distinguish gender, became a goddess and was 
made the wife of Samas, while the latter god par- 
tially absorbed the primitive fire-god Savul. Thus 
it was with the fate of many of the pre-historic 
divinities of Babylonia. Anuna met with a still 
worse fate. He was worshiped as the local god 
of Sippara of Anunit, which stood near Sippara of 
Samas. When this primaeval divinity was 
adopted by the Semites, they created for him a 
consort, Anunit, who saved her life by being 
identified with Istar, while her lord, who had 
made her own existence possible, passed awa}' 
into almost complete forgetfulness. 

Samas unfastens the bolts of the shining sky, 
opens the door of heaven, and covers the 
immensity of the heavens. He is "the illumin- 
ator of the darkness, the light of the gods, the 
master of the spheres, the lord establisher of life, 



I 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 113 

the powerful head of heaven, the highest of the 
spirits." He helps kings who are devoted to his 
service, Avhen they go forth to war. He is "the 
sui)reme ruler, who casts a favorable eye on 
expeditions, the vanquisher of the king's enemies, 
and the breaker-up of opposition." He causes 
nionarchs to "assemble their chariots and their 
warriors," and "goes forth with the armies."* 

When Nebuchadnezzar repaired the temple 
of the sun at Sankereh, he prayed: "0 Sun! 
Great Lord ! into the temple of Tarah, thy divine 
dwelling-place, in joy and gladness when thou 
shalt enter the pious works of my hands, regard 
with pleasure ! and a life of prolonged days, a 
firm throne, a long reign, may thy lips proclaim 
for me ! and may the gates and doors, and halls, 
and apartments of the temple of Tarah, which I 
have built with no sparing of expense, remain 
recorded in thy book!"f 

The Accadian spirit of the sun and the 
early sun-god were the powerful enemies of 
all evil demons, and many of the hymns ad- 
dressed to the god are full of magical incanta- 
tions and formulae. Some passages of purity 
may be selected. 



■ C'f. Lenormant, Records of the Past, Vol. XI, pp. 123-128; 
Oppert, \o\. XI, p. 26 ; Smith, Vol. V. p. 54. 

t Talbot, Records of the Past, Vol. VII, p. 72. 
10 



1 1 4 FIR /-; FR OM S TRA AW A' A L TA RS. 

"O Hun-god, oil the lioiizon of lieavoii llioii (luwiicst ! 

The jjure bolts of Iieaveii thou opciiest ! 

Tlie doors of heaven thou opene.st ! 

() Sun-god, tliou liftest up thy head to the world ! 

() Sun-god, thou covere.st the earth with the hrigiit firnia- 

nient of lieaven ! 
'J'liou seltcMt the ear to (the prayers) of mankind ; 
Tliou plantest the foot of mankind . . . 
The cattle of the god (Nor) thou cidightcncHt." 

"O Sun-god, the (supreme) judge of tlie worhl art thou! 
() lord of the living creation, the ])itifid ouv. who (directest) 

the world ! 
O Sun-god, on this day j)urify ami illumiiK- the king the 

sun of his god ! 
Let all that is wrought, of evil which is in ids body he 

removed elsewhere ! 
Like the cup of Zoganes, cleanse him ! 
Like a cup of ghee, mak(i him bright ! 
Like the co[)per of a polished tablet, let him be made bright! 
Undo his curse ! 

Until the day when h(( shall live, the sui)remacy 
With Ann and Mul-lil .... 
Direct the law of th<- midtitudes of mankind! 
Thdu ait eternal righteousness in the heaven! 
Thou art justice, even the bond of the ears of the world! 
Thou know(!st right, tliou knowest wickedness! 
O Sun-god, righteousness has lifted up its foot! 
Sun-god, wickedness has been cut as with a knife! 
() Sun-god, the minister of Ann and Mullil art thou! 
() Sun-god, the judg(!SUj)reiiH! of heaven and earth art thou !" 

"O Sun-god, in the midst of heaven, at thy setting, 
May tlu! inclosure of the pure heaven speak to thee of peace! 
May the gat(! of heaven be thy bond I 



CODS .1 A7> NO GODS. 1 1 5 

May the (lirc'ctiii<; ffn], [lie messenger who loves thee, 

direct thy wny. 
In fi-lkhdra, the seat of thy sovereignty, thy supremacy 

rises like the dawn. 
May A, the wife whom thou lovest, come l)ef'ore thee 

with joy ! 
May thy heart take rest ! 

May the glory of thy divinity be established for thee ! 
O Sun-god, warrior hero, may it exalt thee in strength ! 
O lord of E-Bal)ara, as thou marcliest, mny it direct tliy 

course ! 
Direct thy road, march along tlx; path fixed for thy 

pavement. 
O 8un-god, judge of the world, the director of its laws 

art thou !"-•' 

Adar, Niriip, or Uras, was originally n, .sun-god, 
who became the ChaldDean Ilercule.s. He is 
described as "the crusher of opponents, he who 
rolls along the mass of heaven and earth ; treader 
of the wide earth, who has not lessened the 
glory of his face; head of nations, bostowcr of 
scepters; lord of lords, whose hand has controlled 
the vault of heaven and earth ; lord of water- 
courses, seas, and whirlwinds; opener of canals, 
and lord of crops and boundai-ies ; the d(3ity who 
changes not his purposes; the light of heaven 
and earth, whose is the speech of the gods no 
god has ever disregarded; destroyer of them that 
hate him, and son of the Zenith." lie gives 



■^.Saycc!, IIibl)ert Lectures, 1««7, pp. 401, 499, 500, 513. 



116 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

power over every beast of the field, and reigns 
as the monarch of all the nations of the earth. 
He was also " the hero of the gods, the supporter 
of the deities of heaven and of rain-storms, the 
bright one whose powers are unequaled, the 
chief of the Annunaki, the most powerful of the 
gods, lord over the face of the whirlwind, and 
first-born of Bel," or Mul-lil. Sometimes he is 
described as a mythical monarch, who performs 
wonderful exploits — "like a bull destroying his 
companions, like a great buffalo lifting up his 
horns." With Nergal, he was the special guardian 
of Tiglath Pileser I, and gave this ancient Nimrod 
power over the beasts of the field.* 

According to Lehmann, Adrammelech is the 
same as the goddess Adar-malkat, "Adar the 
queen," or A, or Anunit, the goddess of births, 
corresponding to the Semitic goddess Erua, ''the 
begetter." Erua is an Aramaic form, and we 
have the B;i,bylonian Eritu, a name of Istar. 
Eru, "the handmaid," is an Accadian title of 
Zarpanit, 

If Adar was a sun-god, it was "the meridian 
gun," whose scorching rays represented the fiercer 
side of his character. His consort was called 
"the lady of the dawn." An oracle was attached 



■Various Translators, Records of the Past, Vol. I, p. 11 ; III, 
pp. 39, 40; V, p. 108; IX, p. 96; XI, p. 9; 2 Kings xvii, 30. 



G ODS AND NO-G ODS. 117 

to his shrine, and he was "the lord of the oracle," 
"the oracle supretne," and "the voice." 

The Accadians worshiped the wind, whether 
the beneficent wind, the cooling breeze of 
summer, the wind which brought the refreshing 
and fertilizing rain, or the evil wind laden with 
the cold storm, the raging tempest, or the burning 
desert sands. Hence the seven winds — " the 
sword of rain, the vampire, the leopard, the 
serpent, the watch-dog, the violent tempest which 
blows against god and king, and the baleful 
wind " — were seven evil spirits ; and yet not essen- 
tially evil, for they were "the messengers of Anu 
their king." Matu was the especial god of the 
tempest, and was much dreaded. He had been 
sent down to drown mankind in the Deluge, and 
his return was greatly feared. There were also 
several storm-gods, called "the gods Matu." 
There is an old hymn which relates to the Matu 
gods: 

"They are the destructive reptiles, even the winds that 

create evil ! 
As an evil reptile, as an evil wind, do they appear ! 
As an evil reptile, as an evil wind, who marches in front 

are they ! 
Children monstrous, monstrous sons are they ! 
Messengers of the pest-demon are they ! 
Throne-bearers of the goddess of Hades are they ! 
The whirlwind which is poured upon the land are they ! 



118 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

The seven are gods of the wide-spread heaven. 

The seven are gods of the wide-spread earth. 

The seven are gods of the (four) zones. 

The seven are gods seven in number. 

Seven evil gods are they ! 

Seven evil demons are they ! 

Seven evil consuming spirits are they ! 

In heaven are they seven, in earth are they seven !"* 

When Matu becume a Semitic god he absorbed 
the attributes of another god whose original 
name was Meri, the air-god, now generally known 
under the Biblical name Rimmon. The popu- 
larity of this god in his beneficent character grew 
in Babylonia and Assyria, and his worship became 
less local than that of the other great gods which 
have been named. 

Rimmon was the god of storms and tempests, 
of rain and whirlwind, of thunder and lightning, 
of floods and water-courses — the god of the air, 
"who causes the tempest to rage over hostile 
lands and wicked countries." He destroyed 
crops, rooted up trees, and was followed by 
famine and pestilence. He was called " the great 
guardian of heaven and earth, the intelligent 
guide, the lord of the visible world, the lord of 
knowledge, glory, and life." His most usual 
symbols were the serpent and the triple or 
double bolt. In his milder and most popular 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 207. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 119 

character, he is '' the careful and beneficent chief, 
the giver of abundance, the lord of fecundity, 
the lord of canals, and the establisher of works 
of irrigation."* 

In the west, Rimmon was identified with the 
sun-god Hadad, and became the supreme god of 
the northern Syrian tribes. His worship was 
celebrated as far south as the valley of Jezreel.f 

His wife was called Sala, an Accadian name, 
and was "the lady of the mountain," as Rimmon 
was "the lord of the mountain." The wife of 
the sun-god of Eridu was also called " the lady 
of the mountain," and Zarpanit had the same 
designation. We may therefore conclude Sala 
and Zarpanit were originally the same divinity. 
Another appellation of Sala was " the lady of the 
desert," and her consort was "the ever-glowing 
sun of the desert land." In a penitential psalm 
she was Gubara, " the fire-flame," and was doubt- 
less the morning and evening star which rises 
over the top of the mountains. She was the 
goddess of wisdom and of hidden treasures 
and the goddess of the copper hand, with 
which compare the Celtic "Nuada of the silver 
hand."t 



■■•■ Eawlinson, Ancient Monarchies, Vol. I, pp. 164, 165. 

tZech. xii, 11; 2 Kings v, 18. 

% Fradenburgh, The Gods of our Fathers. 



120 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

But few hymns addressed especially to 
Rinimon have been recovered. We ofi'er a single 
fragment : 

"(Riraraou in) his anger has bound for him the heaven. 

Rimmon in his strength has shaken for him the earth. 

The mighty mountain, thou hast overwhehned it. 

At his anger, at his strength, 

At his roaring, at his thundering. 

The gods of heaven ascend to the sky, 

Tlie gods of earth descend to the earth. 

Into the horizon of heaven they enter. 

Into the zenith of heaven they make their way."* 

It will be seen that it is not always possible 
to discover consistency in old mythologies ; and 
this is especially true when two religions, a 
newer and an older, formerly belonging to alien 
races, have been amalgamated, as has been the 
case with that which is the subject of our 
present study. 

*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 500. 



V. 

GODS AND NO-GODS. 



PART SECOND. 



BABYLONIAN kings, like those of Assyria 
and Judah, were buried in their own pal- 
Jices, and yet more than one general necropolis 
became famous in early times. Such a city of 
the dead was situated in the neighborhood of 
Cutha, which is now represented by the mounds 
of Tel-Ibrahim. The primitive Accadian name 
was Gudua, " the resting-place," and it is inter- 
esting to remark that "cemetery" is an Aryan 
word with the same etymological meaning. 
Nerra or Ner — '" the strong one," " the bright 
one," " the god of the high voice " — was the old 
god of Gudua. He was the personification of 
death, and had his throne in Hades, where he 
ruled over '• the great city," and hence he came 
to be known as Nergal, "the great Ner." But 
he was also "the king of Cutha," "the king of 
heaven," "the king who marches before Anu," 
and "the mighty sovereign of the deep." The 
last title would connect him with Eridu, and he 
may have been originally a water-spirit. As the 

11 121 



122 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

lord of Hades he was the son of Mul-lil, and 
''the hero of the gods." Laz was his wife, but 
Ave have little knowledge concerning her attri- 
butes. The Semites made him the champion of 
the gods, who slays only the wicked, and not 
alike the evil and the good. Though he lost his 
character as the god of the lower world, yet a 
survival remained — mankind being called "the 
cattle of Ner." 

The old priests of Chaldsea chanted the hymn: 

"O warrior, the mighty deluge, that sweepest away the 

hostile laiid ! 
O warrior of the gi'eat city of Hades, that sweepest away 

the hostile land ! 
god that comest forth from 'Sulim, that sweepest away 

the hostile laud ! 
O mighty ruler, illustrious lord, that sweepest away the 

hostile laud ! 
O lord of Cutha, that sweepest away the hostile land! 
O lord of the temple of 'Sulim, that sweepest away the 

hostile land ! 
O gallos-spirit of the divine master of the dawn, that 

sweepest away the hostile land ! 
O warrior of the god Supulu, that sweepest away the 

hostile land ! 
The mighty deluge, who has no rival ; 
The uplifter of the weapon, who threshes out opposition !"* 

Merodach was the local god of Babylon. It 
would seem from inscriptions lately recovered 

*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 496. 



OODS AND NO-OODS. 123 

that Xabonidus, with the instinct of an antiqua- 
rian and the spirit of a reformer, had removed 
the images of the gods from their ancient sanc- 
tuaries and had collected them in Babylon. Re- 
ligion Mild ciA'il government were closely bound 
together. When Babylon held the supremacy 
among cities, Merodach was the god of gods. 
When the civil power Avas centralized in Baby- 
lon, the centralization of religion would naturally 
follow. But it was not an easy task to destroy 
the local cults, which had lived thousands of 
years, and gather them into one holy city. An- 
cient shrines would resent such a movement. 
Merodach himself would not brook the presence 
of equals in his own home. Dissatisfaction would 
spread among priests and people. This attempted 
change in the old cults of Babylonia cost Nabo- 
nidus the throne, and resulted in the downfall of 
the kingdom. Merodach chose Cyrus, and ap- 
pointed him to the sovereignty. Babylon yielded 
after a single battle, and Cyrus restored the of- 
fended gods to their own shrines, and rebuilt 
their temples. 

"Merodach, the great lord, the restorer of his 
people, beheld with joy the deeds of his vice- 
gerent, who was righteous in hand and heart. 
To his city of Babylon he summoned his march, 
and he bade him take the road to Babylon ; like 



124 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

a friend and a comrade he went at his side." 
It is most interesting to compare the record of 
the inscriptions with the language of the Old 
Testament.* 

Merodach is a merciful god ; the interpreter 
of Ea, the god of wisdom ; and raises the dead 
to life.f 

As the sun-god he fights against Tiamat, the 
primaeval dragon of darkness. J 

A hymn which may liave been used in the 
religious service of his temple is defective, but 
we quote a fragment : 

" (Thou art) the king of the laud, the lord of the world! 

O first-born of Ea, omnipotent over heaven and earth. 

O mighty lord of mankind, king of (all) lands, 

(Thou art) the god of gods, 

(The prince) of heaven and earth who hath no rival, 

The companion of Anu and Bel (Mul-lil), 

The merciful one among the gods, 

The merciful one who loves to raise the dead to life ; 

Merodach, king of heaven and earth. 

King of Babylon, lord of E-Sagila, 

King of E-Zida, king of E-makh-tilla (the supreme house 

of life). 
Heaven and earth are thine ! 
The circuit of heaven and earth is thine ! 



* Cf . Isaiah xliv, 28 ; xlv, 1-7 ; see also Jeremiah and Daniel ; 
1 Sam. xxvi, 19. 

t Various Translators, Records of the Past, Vol. V, pp. 116, 
139 ; VIII, p. 75. 

Ilsaiah. xxiv, 21, 22 ; Rev. xii, 7-9. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 125 

The incantation that gives life is thine ! 

The breath that gives life is thine ! 

The holy writing of the month of the deep is thine! 

Mankind, even the black-headed race (of Accad), 

All living souls that have received a name, that exist in 

the world, 
The four quarters of the earth, wheresoever they are, 
All the angel hosts of heaven and earth, 
(Regard) thee and (lend to thee) an ear." 

Nebuchadnezzar says : " To Merodach, my 
lord, I prayed; I began to him my petition; the 
word of my heart sought him, and I said: '0 
prince that art from everlasting, lord of all that 
exists, for the king whom thou lovest, whom 
thou callest by name, as it seems good unto thee 
thou guidest his name aright, thou watchest over 
him in the path of righteousness ! I, the prince 
who obeys thee, am the work of thy hands; 
thou Greatest me and hast intrusted to me the 
sovereignty over multitudes of men, according to 
thy goodness, lord, which thou hast made to 
pass over them all. Let me love thy supreme 
lordship, let the fear of thy divinity exist in my 
heart, and give what seemeth good unto thee, 
since thou maintainest my life.' Then he, the 
first-born, the glorious, the first-born of the gods, 
Merodach the prince, heard my prayer and ac- 
cepted my petition."* 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 97, 99. 



126 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Neriglissar addressed the god in the prayer: 
" god Merodach, great lord, lord of the house 
of the gods is his name, light of the gods, father, 
even for thy high honor which changeth not, a 
house have I built. May its fulhiess increase ! 
May it acquire tieasures in its midst ! May its 
tribute augment from West to East by the rising 
sun from the kings of the nations of all men ! 
Their many tributes may it receive w^ithin (its 
walls) ! May they come within it forever ! May 
their approach copiously prevail !" 

Merodach,, his wife Zarpaint, and their son 
Nebo, formed an old Babylonian triad. The Ac- 
cadian triads were usually male deities, 1)ut the 
Semites introduced the element of sex in relig- 
ion. Zarpaint was identified with the Accadian 
Gasmu, "the wise one." She was entitled "the 
lady of the deep," "the mistress of the abode of 
the fish," and "the voice of the deep," and must 
originally have ranked with the god Ea. She 
was also identified with the goddess Lakhamun, 
who was worshiped in Dilmun, a sacred island, 
and the goddess Elagu, of the mountains of 
Elam. Her special shrine was just inside the 
temple of Merodach, and here every woman of 
Babylon was obliged to prostitute herself once in 
her life. Babylonian legends found at Khorsa- 
bad, on little clay olives, bear witness to this 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 127 

frightful custom. The Succoth-Benoth of the 
Old Testament — " tents of daughters " — may refer 
to the tents of this prostitution.* 

Nebo and his wife Tasmit had a temple in 
Borsippa, now represented by the ruins Birs-i- 
Nimroud. This temple was called E-Zida, "the 
constituted house," while its holy of holies was 
'• the supreme house of life," and its tower " the 
house of the seven spheres of heaven and earth." 
There was also a shrine, E-Zida, within the great 
temple of Merodach. 

Nebo was " the god of the holy mound," and 
bore the titles: "The wise," "the intelligent," 
" the creator of peace," " the author of the ora- 
cle," "the creator of the written tablet," "the 
maker of writing," " the opener," and '• the en- 
larger of the ear." He was also called " the 
overseer of the angel hosts of heaven and earth," 
and " the bond of the universe." The latter 
title finds its explanation in the name of the 
tower of his temple — " the house of the seven 
bonds of heaven and earth." " The seven ' bonds ' 
seem to represent the seven planets, or rather 
their stations; the tower was in seven stages, 
and each stage was painted so as to symbolize 

* Oppert, Records of the Past, Vol. XI, pp. 43, 44 ; Rawlin- 
son's Herodotus, Vol. I, pp. 265, 266; Bohn's Strabo, Vol. Ill, 
p. 155 ; Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 95, 110-112 ; Jeremias, 
43 ; 2 Kings xvii, 30. 



128 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the colors symbolical of the seven planets. 
Nebo must, therefore, have once been an ele- 
mental god, or at all events a god connected with 
the chief of the heavenly bodies." " The deep," 
which surrounded the earth like the Oceanos of 
Homtir, was compared to a snake or a rope, and 
was called " the rope of the great god." It was 
personified by Innina, or the deity Nina or Nana. 
Sayce thinks it possible that Innina may have 
been the primitive Nebo of Borsippa. 

Nebo was the god of knowledge, science, and 
hterature. Together with Tasmit he invented 
writing, and directed the education of Assyrian 
kings. " Assurbanipal asserts that Nebo and 
Tasmit had ' made broad his ears, and enlight- 
ened his eyes,' so that he ordered all the char- 
acters of the syllabaries and the an(;ient writings 
of Accad to be explained and written down." 
The tablets of the royal library, discovered at 
Nineveh, are called " the wisdom of Nebo." 

Upon the dedication of a temple, Nebuchad- 
nezzar prayed: '"0 Nebo, noble son, exalted 
(messenger), and beloved offspring of Marduk, 
my works of piety behold joyfully ! A long life, 
abundant offspring, a firm throne, a prolonged 
reign, the subjection of all rebels, the conquest 
of my enemies' land, grant to me as a recom- 
pense." He is " the lord of lords, who has no 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 129 

equal in power ;" and he " grants to kings the 
scepter of royalty for the governance of the 
people."* 

The following is a hymn to Nebo : 

"To Nebo, the supreme messenger, who binds all things 

together, 
The scribe of all that has a name, for thy purity (ascribe) 

the lordship. 
The lifter-up of the stylus supreme, the director of the 

world. 
The possessor of the reed of augury, the traverser of strange 

(lands). 
The opener of the wells, the fructifier of the corn, 
The god without whom the irrigated laud and the canal 

are un(watered). 
The glorious lord who pours out the oil of anointing and 

the unguent, 
Hear the prayer, (consider) the supplication ! 
O mighty hero, king (of E-Zida?)!"t 

The wisdom of Ea was transmitted to the 
people, not only directly, but also through the 
line of Merodach and Nebo. Since Nebo was 
the god of the learned class, his cult kept pace 
with the march of literature and science, and he 
became the least local of all the gods which we 
have named. His worship was important in 

*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 115; Cooper, Archaic 
Dictionary, p. 557 ; Various Translators, Records of the Past, 
Vol. I, p. 58 ; V, pp. 122-139 ; VII, p. 77 ; XI, p. 101. 

tSayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, p. 488. * 



130 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Assyria, and passed on to the Semitic tribes of 
the West. 

Nebo was sometimes confused with Nuzku. 
The latter god was originally " the messenger of 
Mul-lil." When this older Bel of Nipur became 
merged in the younger Bel-Merodach, Niizku fol- 
lowed the fate of his master. He was called 
"the lord of the zenith," and his name signifies 
" the brilliance of the daybreak." 

The primitive sun-god of Eridu was Tam- 
muz — the name appears in several forms — and 
Davkina appears to have been both his wife and 
mother. The cult of Tammuz was transported 
to Accad, where he had a temple called " the 
tower of mighty bulk " and " the shrine of ob- 
servation." Istar must have been the same as 
Davkina and Tillili, the primordial earth, and in- 
herited, during the long period of her prominence 
in the Accadian and Semitic religions, the cults 
and beliefs of many other deities. There were 
many blunders as to her sex in her adventures 
among the Semites. In the Old Testament the 
feminine termination is attached to her name to 
satisfy the grammatical instinct. The Moabites 
made her a male divinity, and Dilbat, the planet 
Istar, was " a female at sunset and a male at sun- 
rise" — a " maless " would be the English imita- 
tion of the artificially-coined word. She is even 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 131 

made the sun-god himself. At sunrise she was 
" Istar of Accad," or " Istar of the stars ;" at 
sunset she was " Istar of Erech," or " the mis- 
tress of the gods." 

Of all the old goddesses, Istar alone main- 
tained her independent character; and was in all 
respects equal to Bel or any other of the gods, 
except in the West, where Ashtoreth and'Astarte 
became subordinate to the supreme Baal. When 
we seek her genealogy, we find that she was the 
daughter of Sin, or of Anu. She formed, with 
Sin and Samas, an important Babylonian triad. 

" Her worship was a reflection of that wor- 
ship of nature which underlay the Semitic con- 
ception of Baalism. The fierce passions excited 
by an Eastern sun found their expression in it. 
Prostitution became a religious duty, whose 
wages were consecrated to the goddess of love. 
She was served by eunuchs, and by trains of 
men and boys who dressed like women, and gave 
themselves up to women's pursuits. Istar, in 
fact, had ceased to be the 'pure' goddess of the 
evening star. The other elements ?n her hybrid 
character had come to the front, aided by the 
Semitic conception of the female side of the di- 
vinity. She was now the fruitful goddess of the 
earth, teeming with fertility, the feminine devel- 
opment of the life-giving sun-god, the patroness 



132 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

of love. The worshiper who would serve her 
truly had to share with her her pains and pleas- 
ures. Only thus could he live the divine life, 
and be, as it were, united with the deity. It 
was on this account that the women wept with 
Istar each year over the fatal wound of Tammuz; 
it was on this account that her temples were 
filled with the victims of sexual passion and re- 
ligious frenzy, and that her festivals were scenes 
of consecrfited orgies. As the worship of the 
goddess spread westward, the revolting features 
connected with it spread at the same time. The 
prophets of Israel denounce the abominations 
committed in honor of Ashtoreth and Baal 
within the sacred walls of Jerusalem itself; the 
Gieek writers stand aghast at the violations of 
social decency, enjoined as religious duties on 
the adorers of the Oriental Aphrodite ; and Lu- 
cian himself — if Lucian indeed be the author of 
the treatise — is shocked at the self-mutilation 
practiced before the altar of the Syrinn goddess 
of Hierapolis. From Syria, the cult, with all its 
rites, made its way, like that of Attys-Adonis, to 
the populations beyond the Taurus. At Komana, 
in Kappadokia, the goddess Ma was ministered 
to by six thousand eunuch priests ; and the Galli 
of Phrygia rivaled the priests of Baal and Ash- 
toreth in cutting their arms with knives, in 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 133 

scourging their backs, and in piercing their flesh 
with darts. The worship of the fierce powers of 
nature, at once life-giving and death-dealing, 
which required from the believer a sympathetic 
participation in the sufferings and pleasures of 
his deities, produced alternate outbursts of fren- 
zied self-torture and frenzied lust."* 

The account of the descent of Istar into 
Hades in search of the water of life, wherewith 
to call back to the world her beautiful bride- 
groom, who had met with an untimely death, 
caused by the cold of winter or the dark powers 
of the under-world, doubtless draws its material 
from Accadian sources. Ezekiel saw the women 
of Jerusalem " weeping for Tammuz," and Jere- 
miah gives the very words of the lamentation : 
*' Ah me, my brother ; and ah me, my sister ! Ah 
me, Adonis ; and ah me, his lady !" f Istar, in 
the story to which we have referred, cries: "0 
my brother, the only one !" Other passages of 
Scripture find their explanation in this refrain. J 

The Adonis and Aphrodite of Greek my- 
thology are of the same origin, Adonis being but 
the Phoenician Adoni, " my lord," " the very 
word of the wail." The dirge was known in 



* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 266, 267, 
TEzek. viii, 14; Jer. xxii, 18. 
JZech. xii, 11 ; Amos viii, 10. 



134 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Greece in Homeric days, and is found in Greek 
tragedy.* At Gebal or By bios, the death of 
Adonis was especially comuiemorated. When in 
the spring-time the rains and snows from the 
mountains stained the waters of the river Adonis 
with red, the people, beholding in the stream the 
blood of the slaughtered god, held a funeral 
festival in his honor. Under Egyptian influence, 
the sun-god and his spouse being connected with 
Osiris and Isis, the days of mourning were 
followed by days of rejoicing since the god was 
believed to have regained the strength of his 
youth. The same thought we find repeated in 
the mythologies of other races. The poem 
which relates Istar's search for her beautiful 
Tammuz will be read with interest. 

"To the laud whence none return, the region of (darkness), 
Istar, the daughter of Sin, (inclined) her ear, 
Yea, Istar herself, the daughter of Sin, inclined (her) ear, 
To the house of darkness, the seat of the god Irkalla, 
To the house from whose entrance there is no exit, 
To the road from whose passage there is no return. 
To the house from whose visitors the light is excluded, 
The place where dust is their bi-ead (and) their food is mud. 
Tlie light they behold not, in darkness they dwell ; 
They are clad like birds in a garment of feathers. 
Over the door and the bolt the dust is scattered. 
Istar, on arriving at the gate of Hades, 



Homer, Iliad XVIII, 570; .Eschylos, Agamemnon, 121. 



GODS AND XO~GODS. 135 

To the keeper of the gate addresses the word : 

' Opener (keeper) of the waters, open thy gate ! 

Open thy gate that I may enter! 

If thou opeuest not the gate that I may enter, 

I will smite the door, the bolt I will shatter, 

1 will smite the threshold and pass through the portals. 

I will raise up the dead to devour the living ; 

Above the living the dead shall exceed in number.' 

The keeper opened his mouth and speaks ; 

He says to the princess Istar : 

' Stay, O lady, thou must not break it down ! 

Let me go and declare thy name to Nin-ki-gal, the queen 

of Hades.' 
The keeper descended and declares (her name to Niu-ki-gal 

[Allat]): 
'O goddess, the water thy sister Istar (is come to seek); 
Trying the mighty bars (she has threatened to break open 

the doors) (?).' 
When Allat (heard) this (she opened her mouth and says:) 
' Like a cut-off herb has (Istar) descended (into Hades); 
Like the lip of a drooping reed she has prayed for (tlie 

waters of life). 
What matters to me her wish ! what (matters to me) her 

anger ? 
(When she says,) this water with (my bridegroom). 
Like food would I eat, like beer would I drink ; 
Let me weep for the heroes who have left (their) wives; 
Let me weep for the handmaids whom from the bosoms of 

their husbands (thou hast taken); 
For the little child let me weep, whom thou hast taken ere 

his days are come. 
Go, keeper (nevertheless), open for her (thy) gate; 
Strip her also according to the ancient rules.' 
The keeper went, he opened for her (his) gate ; 



136 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

'Enter, O lady, let Cutha be glad (at thee); 
Let the palace of Hades rejoice before thee.' 
The first gate lie made her enter, and shut (it); he threw 

down the mighty crown of her head. 
' Why, O keeper, hast thou thrown down the mighty crown 

of uiy head ?' 
' Enter, O lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
The second gate he made her enter and he shut ; he threw 

away the earrings of her ears. 
' Wherefore, O keeper, hast thou thrown away the earrings 

of my ears?' 
' Enter, O lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
The third gate he made her enter and he closed ; he threw 

away the precious stones of her neck (lace). 
• Wherefore, O keeper, hast thou thrown away the precious 

stones of my neck (lace)?' 
'Enter, O lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
The fourth gate he made her enter and closed ; he threw 

away the ornaments of her breast. 
' Wherefore, keeper, hast thou thrown away the orna- 
ments of my breast?' 
' Enter, lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat,' 
The fifth gate he made her enter and closed ; he threw 

away the gemmed girdle of her waist. 
' Wherefore, O keeper, hast thou thrown away the gemmed 

girdle of my waist?' 
' Enter, O lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
The sixth gate he made her enter and closed ; he threw 

away the bracelets of her hands and her feet. 
' Wherefore, O keeper, hast thou thrown away the brace- 
lets of my hands and my feet ?' 
'Enter, O lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
The seventh gate he made her enter and closed ; he threw 

away the cincture of her body. 



GODS AND NO-GODS. 137 

* Wherefore, O keeper, hast thou thrown away the cincture 

of my body?' 
' Enter, lady, (for) thus are the orders of Allat.' 
After that Istar had descended into the land of Hades, 
Allat beheld her and was haughty before her. 
Istar took not counsel, she besought her with oaths. 
Allat opened her moutb, and says 
To Namtar (the plague-demon), her messenger, the word 

she utters : 
' Go, Namtar, (take Istar from) me, and 
Lead her out ; sixty times (strike) Istar (with disease) — 
The disease of the eyes (into) her (eyes) ; 
The disease of the side (into) her (side) ; 
The disease of the feet into her (feet) ; 
The disease of the heart into (her heart) ; 
The disease of the head strike (into her head) ; 
Into her, even the whole of her, and into (each limb strike 



But after Istar had left the abodes of men, 
there was trouble on the earth. Pap-sukal, the 
messenger of the mighty gods, reported the con- 
dition of affairs to the sun-god. 

"The sun-god went; in the presence of Sin, his father, 

he (stood), 
In the presence of Ea, the king, (his) tears flowed down." 

As the result of the representations made to 
Ea, he formed a creature — whose nature and 
character are still obscure — and sent him to 
Hades to secure the release of Istar. 

" 'Go, Atsu-su-namir, towards the gate of Hades set thy 

face ; 
Let the seven gates of Hades be opened before thee ; 
12 



138 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Let Allat see thee and rejoice at thy presence, 
When her heart is at rest and her liver is appeased. 
Conjure her also by the names of the great gods. 
Turn thy heads; to the resting-place of the stormy wind 

set thine ear; 
The home of the pure one, the resting-place of the stormy 

wind, let them prepare (?) ; the waters in the midst 

let her drink.' 
When Allat heard this 
She struck her girdle, she bit her thumb — 
' Thou hast asked of me a request none should request ! 
Go, Atsu-su-namir, let me injure thee with a great injury! 
May the garbage of the sewers of the city be thy food I 

May the darkness of the dungeon be thy habitation ! 

May the threshold be thy seat ! 

May drought and famine strike thine offspring !' 

Allat opened her mouth and says, 

To Namtar, her messenger, the word she addresses. 

' Go, Naratar, strike open the firmly-built palace, 

Shatter the thresholds (which) bear up the stones of 
light ; 

Bid the spirits of earth (AuUnaki) come forth, and seat 
them on a throne of gold ; 

Over Istar pour the waters of life, and bring her be- 
fore me.' 

Namtar went, (and) smote the firmly-built palace; 

He shattered the thresholds (which) bear up the stones of 
light; 

He bade the spirits of earth come forth ; on a throne of 
gold did he seat (them) ; 

Over Istar he poured the waters of life, and brought her 
along." 



OODS AND NO- GODS. 139 

He passed her through the seven gates, re- 
storing her clothing and ornaments, and said : 

" 'If she (I. e. Allat) has not given thee that for which 
the ransoin is paid, turn back to her again 

For Tammuz, the bridegroona of (thy) youth. 

Pour over him the pure waters, (anoint him) with pre- 
cious oil ; 

Clothe him with a purple robe ; a ring (?) of crystral let 
him strike upon (the hand). 

Let Samkhat (the goddess of joy) enter the liver.' . . . 

(Before this) the goddess Tillili had taken her jewels, 

The eye-stones, also, (which) were unbroken ; 

The goddess Tillili had heard of the death of her brother 
(Tammuz) ; she broke the jewels (which she had 
taken), 

Even the eye-stones, which were full of the face (of 
light?), 

(Crying) : ' O my brother, the only one, do not de- 
stroy me! 

In the day that Tammuz bound on me a ring (?) of crys- 
tal and a bracelet of turquoise, at that time he bound 
(them) on me. 

At that time he bound (them on me). Let the wailing 
men and wailing women 

Bind (them) on the funeral pyre, and smell the sweet 
savor, '"^ 

Thus the earth-goddess seeks the waters of 
life to raise the sun -god, and with him all nature, 
from the sleep of death. Sometimes the myth 
represents Istar as the cause of the death or 

*Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 221-227. 



140 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

enslavement of her own lovers, whom she con- 
trols by her magical influence according to her 
own pleasure. 

There was also a better side to the worship 
of Istar, She was recognized as the divine 
mother who presided over the family life, and as 
such exercised a most gracious influence. This, 
however, never became the popular faith, but was 
confined to the few elect souls whose moral in- 
stinct detected and adopted the best elements 
in the religion, and rejected the worthless and 
the base. 

But Istar was also a war-goddess. In As- 
syria she grew in popularity till she became a 
deity of the first rank. As "' the goddess of 
battles and victories," she gives arms to the 
warrior, upholds him, grants him the help of 
" sixty great gods," and utterly destroys his ene- 
mies. She brings down the high head of the 
proud ; and she exalts, preserves, and strength- 
ens the kingdom. She reached the highest point 
of honor during the reigns of Esnrhaddon and 
Assurbanipal. In an inscription, Esarhaddon 
says : " Istar, queen of war and battle, who loves 
my piety, stood by my side. She broke the 
bows. Their line of battle in her rage she de- 
stroyed. To their army she spoke thus : ' An 
unsparing deity am I.' By her high command 



OODS AND NO- GODS. 141 

(or favor) I planted my standards where I had 
intended." She is frequently represented as a 
winged figure with a halo, and holds a bow in 
her hand. 

When Teumman, king of Elam, threatened 
the empire with invasion, Assurbanipal resorted 
to the temple of Istar, knelt before the goddess, 
and spread out before her the message of the 
warlike king.* Nor was his prayer in vain. 
The deity promised her aid, and bade him dis- 
miss his fears. While the king was offering his 
prayer, at that very hour of the night, a holy 
seer had a prophetic dream, and received a reve- 
lation from Istar. " Istar, who dwells in Arbela, 
entered, and right and left was a quiver uplifted. 
She held a bow in her hand ; she drew a heavy 
falchion to make war; her countenance was 
wrathful. Like a fond mother she speaks with 
thee, she cries to thee. Istar, the exalted of 
the gods, appoints thee this message : ' Thou en- 
treatest to gain victory ; the place lies before 
thee ; I am coming !' Thou shalt answer her 
thus : ' To the place to which thou goest, with 
thee let me go !' The lady of ladies, even she 
declares to thee thus : ' I will defend thee, that 
thou mayest dwell in the sacred precincts of 
Nebo — eat food, drink wine, keep festival, glorify 

*Cf. 2 Kings xix, 14-19. 



142 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



my divinity ; when I have gone, this message 
shall be accomplished. I will cause the desire of 
thy heart to prevail ; th}^ face shall not grow 
pale, thy feet shall not stumble, thy beauty (?) 
shall not fade. In the midst of battle, in her 
kindly womb she embosoms thee and embraces 
thee on every side. Before her a fire is kindled 
(fiercely) to overcome thy foes.' " * 

The Assyrian religion is 
the same as that of Baby- 
lonia, with the addition of 
the national god Assur. 
With the rise of this god, 
the Babylonian gods trans- 
planted to Assyria lost both 
rank and definiteness, but 
continued to receive wor- 
ship. This was accorded 
them, doubtless, largely for 
prudential reasons. Assur, 
like Nisroch, was, at the first, purel}^ a local deity 
of the city of Assur, now Kaleh-Sherghat, the 
primitive capital of the land. The shrine of the 
god was transferred to Nineveh, when this city 




Nisroch of Assur. 



•'Various Translators, Eecords of the Past, Vol. I, pp. 70, 85 : 
III. p. 104; VII, pp. G7, 68; IX, pp. 50, 51; XI, pp. 61-78; 
Bohn's Strabo, Vol. II, pp. 279, 309 ; Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 
1887, pp. 276, 277; Fradenburgh, AVitnesses from the Dust, 
pp. 162-164. 



GOBS AND NO -GODS. 143 

became the capital of the empire. Assur was 
originally the Accadian Ana-sar — Aiisur — "the 
god of the hosts of heaven;" while Ki-sar was 
"the" goddess of the earth and the hosts of 
heaven." By the union of these two the present 
world was produced. An-sar and Ki-.sar appear 
in Damascius under the forms Assoros and Kis- 
sare, and are said to be the offspring of Lakhma 
and Lakhama, and the progenitors of the old Ac- 
cadian triad — -Anu, Mul-lil, and Ea. Assur, the 
capital city, is probably a corruption of the Ac- 
cadian A-usar, "water-bank," and the word was 
easily confused with the god Assur. Thus it 
was that the god and his city became identified. 
The god, however, did not lose his anthropo- 
morphic character. This character asserted itself 
upon his removal to Nineveh, and he became the 
national god who might be compared with the 
Yahveh of Israel. No female divinity was his 
counterpart, but he stood alone as the absolute 
lord of Assyria. 

The chief temple of Assur was dedicated to 
" the mountain of the world." With Merodach, 
he confided sovereign power to Sargon, who was 
called " the viceroy of the gods at Babylon," and 
"the favorite of the great gods." The names of 
the pious are recorded in the book of Assur. 
Tiglath-Pileser prays : " In return for my con- 



144 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

stant piety, may the gods place my name in the 
book of Assur, for all future time, firmly as a 
rock !" His favorite emblem was " the winged 
circle or globe, from which a figure in a horned 
cap is frequently seen to issue, sometimes simply 
holding a bow, sometimes shooting his arrows 
against the Assyrians' enemies.'* 

Around the three chief gods of the Babylonian 
pantheon were grouped a vast multitude of di- 
vinities, so vast that Assurnatsirpal declares that 
there were " sixty-five thousand great gods of 
heaven and earth." New gods were also made 
out of divine titles, and divinities sometimes owed 
their existence to literary errors. Even phrases 
from the ritual were made into gods, and many 
were imported from foreign lands. Back of these 
gods were unnumbered obscure deities and spirits. 
" The lord of hosts " was an expression full of 
significance to the Semites, who inherited this old 
religious system. 

Frequently several gods are elaborately ad- 
dressed in the same inscription. A good example 
is furnished by Sargon : " Samas makes my 
designs successful, Rimmon affords me abun- 
dance ; . . . Bel-El lays the foundation of 
my city; Mylitta-Taauth grinds the painting-stone 



*Oppert, Records of the Past, Vol. XI, p. 17; Rawlinfon, 
Ancient Monarchies, Vol. II, pp. 3, 4. 



GODS AND NO GODS. 145 

in his bosom; . . . Anu executes the works 
of my hand ; Istar excites the men ; . . . Hea 
arranges the marriages ; the Queen of the gods 
presides over child-birth." " Assur lengthens the 
years of the kings he has appointed; he protects 
the armies of the inclosure of the town. Ninip, 
who lays the foundation-stone, fortifies its ram- 
part to distant days." Shalmaneser II addresses, 
with similar elaboration, eleven gods. We are 
reminded of Micah, who had "a house of gods."* 
We can not even name all the gods of the 
Assyrian pantheon. In one inscription we have 
a list of several hundred, with their attributes. 
Several of the gods of rare occurrence have be- 
queathed their names to the sacred historians .f 

* Oppert, Eecords of the Past, Vol. XI, pp. 24, 25 ; Sayce, 
Vol. V, p. 29 ; cf. Judges xvii, 5. 

t2 Kings xvii, 31 ; Gen. xiv, 1-17 ; and elsewhere. 
13 



1 



VI. 

THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 

''TT^HE cosmogonies of Babylonia are especially 
1 interesting because of their connection with 
the Mosaic system as recorded in Genesis. It is 
also profitable to compare the revelations of the 
monuments with other Semitic cosmogonies which 
have been transmitted to us, 'though sometimes 
in a hopelessly fragmentary condition, through 
ancient writers who have drawn from native 
sources. The elements which have entered into 
the present order of things may be variously 
regarded, and there is abundant room for philo- 
sophical speculations. The old Chaldseans strug- 
gled with the deep problems presented. Ac- 
cording to the Accadian theology the gods created 
t the world, while the conquering Semites held 
to the doctrine of generation. When the two 
religions came together, there was more or less 
conflict ; but the Assyro-Babylonians harmonized 
these two hypotheses by assuming a pre-existing 
chaos. 

We will place several of these cosmogonies 
side by side, and institute a brief comparison. 
Berosus is considered a reliable authority, 

146 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 147 

Alexander Polyhistor has preserved fragments 
of his writings, and Eusebius and George the 
Syncellus have transmitted them to us : 

"There was a time in which there was 
nothing but darkness and an abyss of waters, 
wherein resided most hideous beings, which were 
produced of a twofold principle. Men appeared 
with two wings, some with four wings, and two 
faces. They had one body, but two heads — the 
one of a man, the other of a woman. They were 
likewise, in their several organs, both male and 
female. Other human figures were to be seen with 
the legs and horns of a goat. Some had horses' 
feet; others had the limbs of a horse, but before 
were fashioned like men, resembling hippocen- 
taurs. Bulls, likewise, bred there with the 
heads of men ; and dogs, with fourfold bodies, 
and the tails of fishes. Also horses, with the 
heads of dogs ; men, too, and other animals, with 
the heads and bodies of horses and the tails of 
fishes. In short, there were creatures with the 
limbs of every species of animals. Add to these 
fishes, reptiles, serpents, with other wonderful 
animals, which assumed each other's shape and 
countenance. Of all these were preserved de- 
lineations in the temple of Belus at Babylon. 

" The person who is supposed to have presided 
over them was a woman named Omoroca ; which 



148 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

in the Chaldee language is Thalatth ; which in 
Greek is interpreted Thalassa, the sea ; but, 
according to the most true computation, it is 
equivalent to Selene, the moon. All things 
being in this situation, Belus came, and cut the 
woman asunder; and out of one half of her he 
formed the earth, and of the other half the 
heavens ; and at the same time he destroyed the 
animals in the abyss. All this (he says) was an 
allegorical description of nature. For the whole 
universe consisting of moisture, and animals 
being continually generated therein ; the deity 
(Belus), above-mentioned, cut utF his own head ; 
upon which the other gods mixed the blood, as 
it gushed out, with the earth ; and from thence 
men were formed. On this account it is that 
men are rational and partake of divine knowledge. 
This Belus, whom men call Dis (or Pluto), 
divided the darkness, and separated the heavens 
from the earth, and reduced the universe to 
order. But the animals so recently created, 
not being able to bear the prevalence of light, 
died. 

"Belus, upon this, seeing a vast space quite 
uninhabited, though by nature very fruitful, 
ordered one of the gods to take off his head ; 
and when it was taken off, they were to mix the 
blood with the soil of the earth, and from thence 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 149 

to form other men and animals, which should be 
capable of bearing the light. Belus also formed 
the stars, and the sun and the moon, together 
with the five planets."* 

We shall meet with Omoroca again in the 
Tiamat, against whom Merodach victoriously 
fought in the creation legend, and Nergal in the 
tablet of Cutha. The whole struggle represents 
the bringing of order out of apparent disorder. 
According to Berosus, we have the same double 
origin of man as that with which we meet in 
Genesis. In the latter account, it is earthly- 
material and divine breath out of which the 
human being is formed ; in the former account, 
it is earth and divine blood. Again, if science 
shall hereafter prove that in the first origin of 
life in this world there was no distinction of sex, 
we may point to both Berosus and Moses as 
uttering teachings not inconsistent, to say the 
least, with the same doctrine. 

Damascius, a writer of the sixth century, 
who had access to older materials, says : 

"But the Babylonians, like the rest of the 
Barbarians, pass over in silence the One prin- 
ciple of the universe, and they constitute two, 
Tauthe and Apason, making Apason the husband 
of Tauthe, and denominating her the 'mother of 

* Cory, Ancient FragmentSj pp. 58-60. 



150 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the gods.' And from these proceeds an only- 
begotten son, Moymis, which, I conceive, is no 
other than the intelligible world proceeding from 
the two principles. From them, also, another 
progeny is derived, Dache and Dachas ; and 
ji.gain a third, Kissare and Assorus, from which 
last three others proceed, Anus, Illinus, and Aus. 
And of Aus and Davke is born a son called 
Belus, who, they say, is the fabricator of the 
world — the Demiurgus."* 

Abydenus, a disciple of Berosus, writing 
about 268 B. C, says : 

" There was nothing but water in the begin- 
ning, and that was called the sea (Tiamat); 
Belos {Bel-MarduJc) put an end to this state of 
things by assigning to everything its place in 
the world."")" 

The works of Sanchoniathon, the celebrated 
Phoenician author, have been wholly lost, except 
certain fragments which Eusebius has preserved for 
us from the translation which Philo of Byblus 
made into the Greek language about one hundred 
years before the present era. From these invalu- 
able extracts we quote a few sentences : 

"He supposes that the beginning of all things 
was a dark and condensed windy air, or a breeze 



*Cory, Ancient Fragments, p. 92. 
tLenormant, Beginnings of History, p. 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 151 

of dark air, and a chaos turbid and black as 
Eiebns ; and that these were unbounded, and for 
a long series of ages destitute of form (or limit). 
But when this wind became enamored of its own 
first-principles (the chaos), and an intimate union 
took place, that connection was called Pothos; 
and it was the beginning of the creation of all 
things. And it (the chaos) knew not its own 
production; but from its embrace with the wind 
was generated Mot, which some called Ilus 
(mud); but others, the putrefaction of a watery 
mixture. And from this sprung all the seed of 
the creation and the generation of the universe. 
And there were certain animals, not having 
sensation, from which intelligent animals were 
produced; and they were called Zophasemim 
(o'nmn '3)^, Tsophe hashshamayim) — i. e., observers 
of heaven — and they were formed similar to the 
shape of an egg. And Mot shone out with the 
sun, and the moon, and the less and the greater 
stars." 

Our author continues : 

"Of the wind Kolpia and his wife, Bnau, 
which is interpreted Night, were begotten two 
mortal men. Aeon and Protogonus so called ; and 
Aeon discovered food from trees. Those begot- 
ten from these were called Genos and Genea, 
and inhabited Phoenicia, and when great droughts 



152 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

came (upon the land), they stretched their hands 
to heaven, towards the sun, for this (he says) 
they supposed to be the only God, the Lord of 
Heaven, calling him Beehamin, which name 
among the Phoenicians signifies Lord of Heaven, 
but among the Greeks is equivalent to Zeus, or 
Jupiter."* 

We shall discuss the extract from Damascius 
when we reach the Creation tablets. Sancho- 
niathon repeats the story of the primordial chaos, 
dark and without form, brooded over by the 
wind. The creation of the present order of 
things resulted from their union. 

There is a curious and precious fragment from 
a tablet which has come down to us from the 
great temple of Nergal, at Cutha, through the 
library of Nineveh. It may date from the time 
of Khammuragas, about 2350 B. C, but the 
presence of Accadian words shows that it de- 
pends upon pre-Semitic materials. The god Ner- 
gal is the speaker, and represents the character 
of the primordial creation : 

" On a tablet he wrote not, he opened not (the mouth), and 

bodies and produce 
He caused not to come forth in the land, and I approached 

him not. 
Warriors with the body of a bird of the valley, men 



*Cory, Ancient Fragments, pp. 1-5. 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 153 

With the faces of ravens, 

Did the great gods create. 

In the ground the gods created his city. 

Tiamat gave them suck. 

Their progeny the mistress of the gods created. 

In the midst of the mountains they grew up and became 

heroes and 
Increased in number. 

Seven kings, brethren, appeared as begetters; 
Six thousand (in number were) their armies. 
The god Ba-uini, their father, (was) king ; their mother, 
The queen, (was) Melili." 

After many broken lines, the story continues : 

"The first year as it passed, 

One hundred and twenty thousand warriors I caused to go 

forth, and among them 
Not one returned alive. 
The second year as it passed I caused ninety thousand 

soldiers to go forth, and none returned alive. 
The third year as it passed I caused sixty thousand seven 

hundred to go forth, and none returned. 
They were carried away, they were smitten with sickness. 

I ate; 
I lamented ; I rested. 
Thus did I speak to my heart, saying : ' Verily, it is 

I, and 
(Yet) what have I left to reign over? 
I am a king who makes not his country whole, 
And a shepherd who makes not his people whole, 
Since I have produced corpses and left a desert. 
With terror of men, night, death, (and) plague have 1 

cursed it. 
With fear, violence, destruction, (and) famine 
(I have eflfected) the overthrow of all that exist." 



1 54 FIR E FR OM STRA NOE AL TARS. 

The remainder of the tablet is too imperfect 
for quotation. 

In its main features this account from Cutha 
agrees with that of Berosus. In both alike the 
first living beings are imperfect and composite 
in their nature and form; they are nourished by 
the primordial chaos ; and they are finally exter- 
minated by the gods of light. These first crea- 
tions may be considered as experiments, and 
they were certainly partial failures. We possess 
in these old documents a primitive and gross kind 
of Darwinism. The Greek cosmogonies of Hesiod 
contain the same features. 

Tiamat is the Tauthe of Damascius and the 
Thalatth of Berosus ; and also the tehom, or 
"deep," of Genesis, over which the Spirit — ru- 
ach — of God brooded in the beginning of the 
formal work of creation, whose issue was the 
present order of things. At Eridu the deep, 
which was the home of Ea and the other gods, 
was called apzu, in which we recognize the Apa- 
son of Damascius. By a punning etymology, fre- 
quently met with among the Semites, this was 
read ahzu, "the house of knowledge" — an appro- 
priate abode for Ea, the god of wisdom and of 
all science, arts, and culture. This " deep " was 
both the ocean-stream that surrounded the earth, 
and also the great deep above the firmament of 



THE BEOINXINGS OF THINGS. 155 

heaven. As the mother of the gods, it was 
called Zikum or Zigarum, "the heaven," "the 
mother that has begotten heaven and earth." 
It is nothing less than the great deep out of 
which heaven and earth were produced, the Om- 
oroca of Berosus, who was torn asunder by Belus. 
Zikum seems to have been honored in South- 
ern Babylonia under the name of Bahu, " the 
daughter of heaven," "the great mother." Now 
this Bahu has special interest, in that it is the 
bohu of Genesis — " the void," " the empty 
space" — and the Baau of the Phoenicians, over 
which the wind, Kolpia, brooded like the breath 
of God in the Mosaic account. This Bahu may 
have been the chaos of the earth, while apsu, the 
Tiamat of the Semites, was the chaos of the 
great abyss. The distinction between apsu and 
Bohu was forgotten, while Bohu was ever re- 
membered as distinct from Tiamat. Fortunes 
quite diverse awaited the two latter goddesses. 
Bohu became a goddess indeed, while Tiamat de- 
generated, and was left as the demon of chaos. 
It is Tiamat, in this later character, against whom 
Nergal fought in the Cutha tablet. Again, when 
we come to the fourth Creation tablet, we shall 
find the sun-god, Merodach, engaged in a struggle 
with' this monster, and finally slaying her and 
tearing her body asunder. 



156 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Tiamat, as we find her in the first Creation 
tablet, has not lost her pritnordial character as 
the prolific and beneficent mother of the gods. 
The last part of the tablet is lost. Fortunately 
we have the beginning, which reads : 

"At that time the heaven above had not yet announced, 
Or the earth beneath recorded, a name; 
The unopened deep was their generator, 
Mummu-Tiamat (the chaos of the sea) was the mother of 

them all. 
Their waters were embosomed as one, and 
The corn-field was unharvested, the pasture was ungrown. 
At that time the gods had not appeared, any of them ; 
By no name were they recorded ; no destiny (had they 

fixed). 
Then the (great) gods were created ; 
Lakhmu and Lakhamu issued forth (the first), 
Until they grew up, (when) 
An-sar and Ki-sar were created. 
Long were the days, extended (was the time, until) 
The gods Anu, (Bel, and Ea were born) ; 
An-sar and Ki-sar (gave them birth)." 

The agreement between the Chaldaean ac- 
count and that of Damascius is very close. There 
is mention of the same divine bein&;s. Tiamat 
and Apsu are Tauthe and Apason ; An-sar and 
Ki-sar are Assorus and Kisare; Lakhmu and 
Lakhamu are Lache and Lachus ; for thus we 
must read instead of Dache and Dachus. There 
is a single difference : Damascius makes Moymis 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 157 

the son of Apason and Taulhe, while Mummu of 
the tablet is identical with Tiamat. The resem- 
blances with Genesis will be noticed later. We 
note at present only the indefinite time from which 
the beginning of the history dates — "At that 
time;" " In the beginning." (Genesis i, 1.) The 
tablet of Cutha knows nothing about the seven 
" days," or stages of progress, in the creation ; we 
have them in the Chaldsean tablets, as in Genesis. 

Between the first and the second tablet much 
time must have elapsed, for we find that the great 
mother Tiamat has already become the demon of 
Chaos. Professor Delitzsch makes the second 
tablet conclude with the prayer of Merodach to 
capture Tiamat. It would seem, also, that Anu 
and Ea had declined to attack the demon. The 
third and fourth tablets relate the history of this 
struggle. This account, being so thoroughly 
mythological, has nothing in this respect with 
which we may compare the relation of Moses. 

The third tablet begins with the appeal of 
An-sar addressed to Merodach, praying him to 
attack Tiamat, and prophesying his complete 
triumph. Tiamat becomes aware of the counsel 
of the gods. "She has convened an assembly, 
and is violently enraged." We now read : 

*' 'The gods have marched round her, all of them ; 

Up to those whom thou hast created at her side I have gone.' 



158 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

When they were gathered (?) beside her, Tiaraat they 

approached. 
The strong one (Merodach) , the glorious, who desists not 

night or day, 
The exciter to battle, was disturbed in heart. 
Then they marshaled (their) forces; they create darkness. 
'The mother of Khubur, the creatress of them all, 
I pursued with (my) weapons unsurpassed ; (then) did the 

great snake(s) bite. 
With my teeth sharpened unsparingly did I bite. 
With poisoned breath like blood their bodies I filled. 
The raging vampires I clothed with terror. 
I hfted up the lightning-flash, on high I launched (it). 
Their messenger Sar-baba . 

Their bodies were struck, but it pierced not their breasts. 
I made ready the dragon, the mighty serpent and the god 

Lakha(ma), 
The great reptile, the deadly beast and the scorpion-man, 
The devouring reptiles, the fish-man and the gazelle-god, 
Lifting up (my) weapons that spare not, fearless of 

battle, 
Strong through the law which (yields?) not before 

the foe. 
The eleven-fold (offspring), like him (their messenger), 

were utterly (overthrown?). 
Among the gods her forces . . 
I humbled the god Kingu in the sight (of his consort?), 

the queen. 
They who went in front before the armv (I smote?), 
Lifting up (my) weapons, a snare for Ti(amat)." 

The battle seems to have been but pre- 
liminary, and yet such has been the success 
that Merodach has earned the praise of the 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 159 

gods. In the fourth tablet, after several lines 
we read : 

"O Merodach, thou art he who avenges us; 

We give thee the sovereignty, (we) the hosts of all the 

universe ! 
Thou possessest (it), and in the assembly (of the gods) 

mayest thou exalt thy word ! 
Never may thy weapons be broken ; may thine enemies 

tremble ! 
O lord, be gracious to the soul of him who putteth his 

trust in thee, 
And destroy the soul of the god who has hold of evil." 

The gods bestow upon Merodach " the scepter, 
the throne and the reign," and give him "a 
weapon unsurpassed, consuming the hostile." 
They now urge : 

"Go, and cut off the life of Tiamat ; 

Let the winds carry her blood to secret places." 

The report of Ea is hopeful to the gods, for 
he says : 

"A path of peace and obedience is the road I have caused 
(him) to take." 

We now reach the account of the great and 
decisive battle : 

"There was too the bow, as his weapon he prepared (it); 
He made the club swing, he fixed its seat ; 
And he lifted up the sacred weapon which he bade his 
right hand hold. 



160 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

The bow and the quiver he hung at his side ; 

He set the lightniug before him ; 

With a glance of swiftness he filled his body. 

He made also a snare to inclose the dragon of the sea. 

He seized the four winds that they might not issue forth, 

any one of them, 
The south wind, the north wind, the east -wind, (and) the 

west wind. 
His hand brought the snare near the bow of his father 

Anu. 
He created the evil wind, the hostile wind, the storm, the 

tempest, 
The four winds, the seven winds, the whirlwind, the un- 
ending wind ; 
And he caused the winds which he had created to issue 

forth, the seven of them. 
Confounding the dragon Tiamat, as they swept after him. 
Then the lord lifted up the deluge, his mighty weapon. 
He rode in the chariot of destiny that retreats without a 

rival . 
He stood firm and hung the four reins at his side." 

We lose the connection here, but evidently 
Merodach is gaining the mastery. When the 
tablet becomes more legible, it continues in 
enthusiastic strains : 

"On that day they exalted him, the gods exalted him, 

The gods his fathers exalted him, the gods exalted him. 

Then the lord approached ; he catches Tiamat by her 
waist ; 

She seeks the huge bulk (?) of Kingu her husband, 

She looks also for his counsel. 

Then the rebellious one (Tiamat) appointed him the over- 
thrower of the command of Bel. 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 161 

But the gods his helpers who marched beside him 
Beheld (how Merodach) the first-born held their yoke. 
He laid judgment on Tiamat, (but) she turned not her 

neck. 
With her hostile lip(s) she announced opposition. 
(Then) the gods (came) to the help of the lord sweeping 

after thee. 
They gathered their (forces) together to where thou wast. 
(And) the lord (launched) the deluge, his mighty weapon; 
(Against) Tiamat, whom he requited, he sent it with these 

words : 
' (War) on high thou hast excited. 
(Strengthen?) thy heart and muster (thy troops) against 

the god(s)."' 

We regret the loss of the middle of this ad- 
dress, but we have the end in the bold challenge : 

"Stand up, and thou and I will fight together!" 

Tiamat called up all her magical powers, and 
directed them against her adversary : 

" When Tiamat heard this, 

She uttered her former spells, she repeated her command. 

Tiamat also cried out vehemently with a loud voice. 

From its roots she strengthened (her) seat completely. 

She recites an incantation, she casts a spell, 

And the gods of battle demand for themselves their arms. 

Then Tiamat attacked Merodach, the chief prophet of the 

gods; 
In combat they joined ; they met in battle. 
And the lord outspread his snare (and) inclosed her. 
He sent before him the evil wind to seize (her) from 

behind. 

14 



162 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

And Tiamat opened her mouth to swallow it. 

He made the evil wind enter, so that she could not close 

her lips. 
The violence of the winds tortured her stomach, and 
Her heart was prostrated and her mouth was twisted. 
He swung the club, he shattered her stomach ; 
He cut out her entrails; he overmastered (her) heart; 
He bound her and ended her life. 
He threw down her corpse ; he stood upon it. 
When Tiamat, who marched before (them) was conquered, 
He dispersed her forces ; her host was overthrown ; 
And the gods, her allies, who marched beside her, 
Trembled (and) feared (and) Lurued their backs. 
They escaped, and saved their lives. 
They clung to one another, fleeiug helplessly. 
He followed them, and shattered their weapons. 
He cast his snare, and they are caught in his net. 
Knowing (?) the regions, they are filled with grief 
They bear their sin, they are kept in bondage. 
And the eleven-fold offspring are troubled through fear." 

The victory is complete. The books of des- 
tiny are captured and become the property of 
the younger gods. Merodach tramples upon 
Tiamat, and breaks her skull with his club; and 
the blood, borne away by the north wind, is car- 
ried to "secret places." He strips Tiamat of 
her skin, ''like a fish," and stretches the skin 
out so as to form therefrom the visible heavens. 
The chaotic waters are made obedient to 
law. * 



*Rev. xii, 7-9; Isa. xxiv. 21. 22. 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 163 

The heavens having been made, the work of 
creation is continued in the fifth tablet : 

'' He prepared the twin mansions of the great gods. 

He fixed the stars, even the twin-stars, to correspond with 

them. 
He oi'dained the year, appointing the signs of the zodiac 

over (it). 
For each of the twelve months he fixed three stars, 
From the day when the year issues forth to the close. 
He founded the mansion of (the sun-god), the god of the 

ferry-boat, that they might know their bonds. 
That they might not err, that they might not go astray in 

any way. 
He estabhshed the mansion of Bel and Ea along with 

himself. 
Moreover he opened the great gates on either side, 
He strengthened the bolts on the left hand and on the 

right, 
And in the midst of it he made a staircase. 
He illuminated the moon-god, that he might be porter of 

the night. 
And ordained for him the ending of the night, that the day 

may be known, 
(Saying:) 'Month by month, without break, keep watch 

in thy disk. 
At the beginning of the month light up the night, 
Announcing thy horns, that the heaven may know. 
On the seventh day, (filling thy) disk, 
Thou shalt open indeed (its) narrow contraction. 
At that time the sun (will be) on the horizon of heaven 

at thy (rising).'" 

The remainder of this tablet is in so mutilated 
a condition that its meaning is too uncertain for 



1 64 FIRE FR OM STRANGE AL TARS. 

quotation. There is a fragment of another tablet 
which Sayce, for some reason which he does not 
state, makes the seventh and last of the series. 
The first few lines read : 

"At that time the gods, in their assembly, created (the 

beasts). 
They made perfect the mighty (monstei's). 
They caused the living creatures (of the field) to come 

forth, 
The cattle of the field, (the wild beasts) of the field, and 

the creeping things (of the field). 
(They fixed their habitations) for the living creatures (of 

the field). 
They distributed (in their dwelliug-^ilaces) the cattle and 

the creeping things of the city. 
(They made strong) the multitude of creeping things, all 

the offspring (of the earth)." 

The rest of the tablet is lost. There are a 
few unplaced fragments of other portions of the 
creation story, but they are all too brief. We 
have no account of the creation of man. It 
doubtless belongs to this last tablet. In a magical 
text of Babylonia concerning the creation of the 
woman we meet with a confirmation of the state- 
ment of Genesis ii, 22, 23.* 



* I have followed iu this discussion the last translation of Sayce, 
Records of the Past, New Series, Vol. I, pp. 122-146 ; cf. Sayce, 
Hibbert Lectures, 1887, pp. 384-390 ; Lenormant. Beginnings of 
History, pp. 47-66, 489-498 ; Schrader, Die Keilinschriften und 
Das Alte Testament, pp. 2-17 ; and the English Translation by 



THE BEGINNINGS OF THINGS. 165 

The series of creation tablets and the Semitic 
fragments which have been preserved in old 
authors, when purged of their mythology, magic, 
and polytheism, are found to bear close and 
interesting resemblances with the Mosaic record 
of Genesis, even to the use of certain words 
which possess special cosmogonic value. We 
have already called attention to some of these 
resemblances. Among them are the primordial 
surging sea, the all-encompassing darkness, the 
divine brooding spirit, the creation proceeding 
from lower to higher forms in the order of 
development, the creation of light necessary to the 
existence of the present order of beings, the ap- 
pointment of the heavenly bodies for signs and 
seasons and days and years, the sun to rule the day 
and the moon to rule the night, and the classes of 
animals with which the earth was peopled. 

In the Chaldsean tablets the constellations 
were arranged according to the signs of the 
zodiac, the solstices and equinoxes seem to have 
been known, and the lunar phases were observed. 
The moon, as the friend of the shepherd and as 
the heaveny body most studied by the old astron- 
omers, had the preference over the sun. Indeed 

Whitehouse, Vol. I, pp. 2-17 ; Boscawen, From under the Dust 
of Ages, pp. 29-64; Delitzsch, Neuer Commentar uber die 
Genesis, pp. 47-68, and the English Translation by Sophia 
Taylor, Vol. I, pp. 72-105. 



166 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the moon might be considered the great shepherd 
of the stars which the Accadians have called 
"sheep."* The Chaldseans drew important 
omens from the observation of the heavenly 
bodies, and the Assyrians attached great impor- 
tance to the moon, which they watched most 
carefully .-|* The sun, moon, and stars are repre- 
sented as making their entrance into the world 
from the regions below the horizon through 
great gates which are opened by guards as they 
approach. These guards were scorpion-headed 
men, whose "heads reached to the threshold of 
heaven, and whose footing was the under-world." 

The accounts of the creation current among 
the Greeks, Scandinavians, Hindus, Persians, and 
other peoples, would furnish additional illustra- 
tions, but we must not enter this inviting field. 

"All these are doubtless wrecks of primitive 
revelations of God, modified, changed, corrupted, 
elaborated, adapted to foreign philosophies and 
mythologies, and yet, in all their wanderings, 
showing traces of their pristine divinity — at 
length, as far as is necessary for purposes of 
morality and religion, rescued, purified, spiritual- 
ized, and recorded by Moses under the direction 
of the Holy Spirit, as we find them in Genesis." 



*Psa. cxlvii, 4. 

t Cf. Num. X, 10 ; Psa. Ixxxi, 3 ; Isa. i, 13. 



II. 



I. 

MY LORD BAAL. 

IMPORTANT ethical questions connected with 
the divine commandment of extermination 
issued against the Canaanites, the conquest of 
Palestine by Joshua, and the wars of the Judges 
and of the Kings, demand a reasonable solution. 
A vindication of the divine policy in these con- 
quests and wars is possible only when the age, 
the races, and the circumstances are thoroughly 
studied. An important contribution to the sub- 
ject is the treatment of that group of religions 
of which the Phoenician may be regarded as the 
fairest representative. The consideration of 
these religions will discover to us at least one 
reason for God's stern dealings with the native 
races of Palestine. In speaking of these relig- 
ions we may use the word Phoenician as a gen- 
eral term, applicable in a loose way to the whole 
group. 

The study of this religion is difficult in the 
extreme. There are no sacred books, with their 
rich stores of knowledge; no important sculptures 
or paintings, with their truthful representations 

15 169 



170 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



of the aspect of the gods and the modes of their 
worship; few monumental inscriptions to be de- 
ciphered, and few attempts at the treatment of 
so important a subject at the hands of foreign 
authors. 

There are few monuments of the Phoenician 
hmguage, and yet the Hebrew so closely resem- 
bles the Phoenician that the prophet Isaiah calls 
the former the language of Ca- 
naan. (Isa. xix, 18.) There are 
a number of votive offerings and 
funeral inscriptions, which are 
mostly Carthaginian. The in- 
scription on the sarcophagus of 
Esmunazar, king of Sidon, con- 
tains imprecations on those who 
would violate his grave, quite in 
the style of the imprecatory in- 
scriptions of the Assyrians and 
The inscription of Mesha, king of 
of Moab, while it preserves the names of native 
gods, is also important in the confirmation it 
lends to several points in the Biblical records.* 
The Carthaginian tablet, from Marseilles, dis- 




Sarcophagus of Es- 
munazar. 

Babylonians. 



*Deut. ii, 32; iv, 43; Num. xxi, 19, 23, 29, 30; xxii, 41 ; 
xxxii ; Josh, xiii, 9, ^5-18 ; xx, 8 ; xxi, 36 ; Judg. xi, 20 ; 1 Sam. 
vii, 12 ; 2 Kings iii, 4-27; x, 33; xiii, 20; 1 Chron. v, 8; vi,78; 
lea. XV, 2, 4, 5 ; Jer. xlviii, 1-3, 18, 19, 22, 24, 25, 34, 41 ; Amos 
ii, 2 ; Fradenburgh, Witnesses from the Dust, pp. 291, 299. 



MY LORD BAAL. 171 

covered near the site of the ancient temple of 
Diana in 1845. fixes the prices of victims to 
be offered as sacrifices. In the ••Poenulus," one 
of the comedies of Plautus, are to be found sev- 
eral Phoenician verses, followed by a Latin trans- 
lation. The Marseilles tablet contains the names 
of gods, and illustrates certain passages in the 
Holy Scriptures ; and the " Poenulus " is not void 
of Phoenician sentiment.* 

Before the conquest of Joshua, the Phoenicians 
were doubtless a literary people. Kirjath-Sepher, 
one of the ancient towns of Palestine — it may 
have been Hittite — means ''the city of books." 
There is mention of court poets, who sung the 
praises of the great kings and conquerors of those 
early times. Tradition referred written laws to 
the god Taaut, and Thoth was the human author. 
Law was even deified under the name of Thuro, 
whose wife was Khusareth, or "harmony." 
Phoenician cities seem to have contained impor- 
tant archives and records. There were also 
treatises on agriculture and various other useful 
arts. But all this — we can not tell how much 
or how little — the breath of time and the wrath 
of man have swept away. 



•■■ De.ut. xxiii, 18 ; Lev. xix, 27 ; xxi, 5 ; 1 Kings viii, 2 ; Jer. 
xliv, 15-19; Fradenburgh, Witnessess from the Dust, pp. 
314-318. 



172 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



Several ancient authors quote from the early 
Phoenician literature. The most important of 
these fragments have been preserved in the 
writings of Eusebius of Ciesarea. Philo of 
Byblos made the translation from a work on the 
hierarchy of the ancient Phoenician gods, drawn 
up by Sanchoniathon of Berytus, at "about the 
time of the Trojan war," and dedicated to Abi- 
baal, king of his own town. Its real date is 
probably not earlier than the third or fourth 
century before the Christian era. 

Old Testament writers re- 
fer to the religion of the 
Canaanites, and the chosen 
people of God frequently 
fell into their idolatries. 
phcEiiician Gem. Coins and a few idols have 

been found in Cyprus and elsewhere, and various 
names of gods have been preserved by these 
means. Monumental discoveries have not yet 
ceased, and hence our information is being in- 
creased constantly, and yet by only small incre- 
ments. With such scanty materinl, we can 
hope to present but an imperfect picture of the 
ancient worship. 

There are indications which it has been thought 
point to a primitive monotheism in Phoenicia. 
The visible order of thino's seems to have been 




MY LORD BAAL. 



173 



looked upon as an emanation of the Divine Being, 
and not as the result of a distinct act of creation. 




face; of baaIv, at baalbec. 
These nations ascribed certain honorific titles to 
the gods, which would seem to indicate that they 



174 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

apprehended the distinct personality of God. 
JEliiin, "the exalted," "the most high," was wor- 
shiped in Canaan before the time of Abraham; 
for Melchizedek was "the priest of El-Eliun." 
The second element in the name of this venerable 
and mysterious priest is identical with S;idyk — 
"the righteous" — and St. Paul correctly trans- 
lates the name "king of righteousness.'* Baal 
means "lord," and we have many Baalim, deter- 
mined by the place of their worship or their 
peculiar ufhce. Such are Baal-Tsidon, "lord of 
Sidon;" Baal-Tars, "lord of Tarsus;" and Baal- 
Peor, "lord of Peor;" Baal-Zebub, "lord of flies;" 
Baal-Berith, "lord of covenants;" Baal-Phegor, 
"lord of licentiousness," and so on. Adoni — 
Hebrew, Adonai — is "my lord," and Baalti, "my 
lady." Melkarth means " king of the city." The 
Kabiri are "the great ones." 

It has been thought that all these names, and 
many others of like character — except that of the 
Kabiri — were originally merely epithets of the 
One Divine Being. The fact of the existence of 
most ancient and primiti\'e goddesses need not 
weigh against this opinion. "It may be that' 
the original conception of female deities differs 
among Semitic and Aryan nations, and that 
these feminine forms . . . were at first in- 



^Gen. xiv, 18; Heb. vii, 2. 



MY LORD BAAL. 



175 



tended only to express the energy or activity, or 
the collective powers, of the deity ; not a sepa- 
rate being — least of all a wife. This opinion 
is certainly confirmed when we see that, in 
a Carthaginian inscription, the goddess Tanit 
is called the face of Baal; and that, in the 
inscription of Eshmunazar, the Sidonian Astarte 
is called the name of Baal''* 
In the inscription of Meslia 
we meet with Chemosh-Ashtar 
as a single deity. From all this 
it has been thought that the 
Phoenician supreme god was 
originally and rogy nous. f An 
insuperable objection to this view 
is the existence of the Kabiri, 
the sons of Sadyk. They were 
actual deties, seven in number, 
and their brother was Eshmun, 
" the eighth." If, therefore, not polytheists at the 
first, the Phoenicians doubtless soon became such, 
and the words which had been used only as epi- 
thets soon came to designate distinct gods. We 
attempt a review of the chief of these divinities. 




*Muller, Science of Jfeligion, pp. 78, 79. 

tSpeaker's Commentary, Vol. I, p. 732; cf. Num. xxv, 3; 
2 Kings i, 2 ; Judges viii, 33 ; and elsewhere ; W. Eobertson 
Smith, The Religion of the Semites, Fundamental Institutions, 
p. 459. 



176 FIRE FR OM S TRANGE A L TARS. 

Baal was " the lord " />«r excellence, " the lord 
of heaven," and " the aged lord." He was known 
in Numidia as "the eternal king." A multitude 
of personal and geographical names, containing 
the name of this god as an element, show the 
wide extent and vast importance of his worship. 
Dedicatory inscriptions sometimes couple Baal 
with a goddess who is usually Tanith. 

Baal-Tammuz, identified with Adonis, is a 
solar god. Each year this god was supposed 
to die and be born again in the 
course of natural phenomena. It 
is the old battle between light and 
darkness, good and evil. His rites 
were celebrated with symbols of 
mourning followed by the most 
EfBgy of Baal, extravagaut rejoicing. The sun as 
a physical object received separate worship.* A 
solar god, called Apollo by classical writers, 
was worshiped in Utica, Carthage, and other 
Phoenician colonies. 

The "high places of Baal" are mentioned in 
the history of Balaam. The Israelites fell into 
this primitive form of idolatry, but repented and 
turned again unto God under the faithful warn- 
ings of Samuel.f They also worshiped Ashto- 




*2 Kings xxiii, 5. 

tNum. xxii, 41 , Judges ii, 13; 1 Sam. vii, 4. 



MY LORD BAAL. 177 

reth, and extended divine honors to a calf, which 
may have symbolized Baal. The organized 
worship of these strange divinities was inaugu- 
rated in Israel under the influence of the wicked 
queen Jezebel, daughter of Ethbaal, king of Tyre 
and Sidon, whom king Ahab had taken in 
marriage. Under the stirring appeals of Elijah, 
the wild prophet of the mountain, the priests of 
Baal were put to death by the people. Jehu, by 
an act of treachery, exterminated the idolaters 
and destroyed the image and the temple of the 
god. The worship, however, was not destroyed, 
but Baalim were numerous to the very end of 
the monarchy. 

High places and groves were consecrated, and 
a numerous priesthood performed the rites of 
worship. Says the prophet : " They have filled 
their places with the blood of innocents ; they 
have built the high places of Baal, to burn their 
sons with fire for burnt-offerings unto Baal." * 
The rites were most fanatical, and the invocations 
were uttered with loud and frantic cries, while 
the priests cut themselves with knives and 
lances.f Of the worship of the priests of Baal 
on Mount Carmel, a late writer says : " They 
now, in their frenzied state, tossed to and fro 
the swords and lances which formed part of their 

* Jer. xix, 4, 5. 1 1 Kings xviii, 28. 



17S FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

fantastic worship, and gashed themselves and 
each other, till they were smeared with blood; 
and mingled with their loud yells to the silent 
and sleeping divinity those ravings which formed 
the dark side of ancient prophecy."* 

The statue of Baal rode on bulls, and was 
represented with bunches of grapes and pome- 
granates in his hands. " Baal was of an ele- 
mental and sidereal character at once. As the 
former, he was god of the creative power, bringing 
all things to life everywhere, and, in particular, 
god of fire ; but he was sun-god besides, and, as 
such, to human lineaments he ndded the crown 
of rays about the head peculiar to this god. In 
the one qualit}^ as well as the other he was 
represented at the same time as sovereign of the 
heavens (Baal-samen), and of the earth by him 
impregnated."-)- 

Ashtoreth was originally " a mere name for 
the energy or activity of God." J She became 
a supreme goddess, and was worshiped with 
special honors in Sidon. She also represented 
the moon, and bore the head of a heifer with 
horns curving so as to form a crescent, whence 
she was called Ashtoreth-Karnaim, "Astarte of 



"••■ Stanley, History of the Jewish Church, Second Series, p. 335. 
t Bollinger, Heidenthum und Judenthum, quoted hy Raw- 
linson in "The Story of Phoenicia," p. 112. 

IRawlinson, The Religions of the Ancient World, p. 139. 



MY LORD BAAL. 



179 



the two horns." (Gen. xiv, 5.) She repre- 
sented the reproductive power of nature, and 
presided over love and sensuality. The Israel- 
ites worshiped her as "queen of heaven."* 
Ashtaroth was the capital of Bashan.f Samuel 
banished her worship, but "Solomon went 
after Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians." 
(1 Kings xi, 5.) According to Herodotus, the 
oldest seat of her worship was at Ascalon, whence 
it was transferred to Cyprus nn<l Cythera. 

Rude stones, in early 
times, were sjmbolical of 
divine power, or were ob- 
jects in which divinity was 
believed to dwell. These 
were called Baetyli or Beth- 
els, and were among the 
earliest objects of worship 
in Asia. '-Such was the Venus of Paphos, the 
Cj'bele of Pessinus, the solar god of Emesa, 
of whom Heliogabalus was priest. The Arabs 
to the time of Mahomet worshiped Venus under 
the form of a stone, on which only a head 
was rudely indicated. This absence of all 
traces of human art gave occasion to the fable 
that they had fallen from heaven, and in modern 
times to the theory of their being aero- 

®Jer. vii, K; xliv, 25. tDeut. i, 4; Josh, xii, 4. ^ 




The Phoenician Ashtoreth. 



180 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

liths."* Her worship became Hellenized where 
it came in contact with Greek influence. The 
Atargatis or Derceto of Plerodotus, to whom a 
temple and sacred lake near Ascnlon were 
consecrated, though differently symbolized, was 
probably the same goddess. The dove was 
consecrated to Venus under all her different 
names. 

"As highest goddess, or queen of heaven, 
Astarte was accounted by the Greeks as Hera; 
yet they also recognized in her something of 
Athene, Aphrodite, Selene, Rhea, Artemis, Nem- 
esis, and the Moirai. In fact, she came nearest 
to the Phrygian Cybele. Scepter and spindle 
in hand, she wore rays and a mural crown on 
her head, and the girdle too, an ornament only 
beseeming Aphrodite-Urania. Her golden statue 
rode next to that of Baal-Zeus, in a chariot 
drawn by lions; a precious stone, placed upon 
her head, illuminated the whole temple by 
night. ... A combined worship was offered 
to the two, Baal and the goddess. Their temple 
at Apheka was so exceedingly rich that Crassus 
spent several days in weighing all the gold and 
silver vessels and precious things that were 
contained in it. These gifts were the combined 
offerings of Arabia, Babylonia, Assyria, Phoenicia, 

*Kenrick, Phoenicia, p. 304. 



MY LORD BAAL. 181 

Cilicia, and Cappadocia, and therefore of all the 
people of the Semitic tongue. In the court of 
the temple there were sacred beasts in a tame 
state in great numbers, and also a pond contain- 
ing holy fish. Priests and temple ministers 
were present in such numbers that Lucian 
counted above three hundred employed in one 
sacrifice; besides these, there were troops of 
flute-players, Galli, and women frenzied with 
inspiration. At the spring festival, called by 
some Hhe brand feast,' by others 'the feast of 
torches,' which was attended by streams of 
visitors from every country, huge trees were 
burnt with the offerings suspended on them. 
Even children were sacrificed ; they were put 
into a leathern bag and thrown the whole height 
of the temple to the bottom, with the shocking 
expression that they were calves and not chil- 
dren. In the fore-court stood two gigantic phalli. 
To the exciting din of drums, flutes, and in- 
spired songs, the Galli cut themselves on the 
arms ; and the effect of this act, and of the music 
accompanying it, was so strong upon mere spec- 
tators, that all their bodily and mental powers 
were thrown into a tumult of excitement ; and 
they, too, seized by the desire to lacerate them- 
selves, inflicted wounds upon their bodies by 
means of potsherds lying ready for the purpose. 



182 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



Thereupon they ran bleeding through the city, 
and received from the inhabitants a woman's 
attire."* 

Melkarth has been regarded as a form of 
Baal, but probably possessed, at least in the later 
development of the religion, a separate person- 
ality. Classical authors identify him ^Yith Her- 




KUIXS OF AXCIEXT TYR 



cules. He is called Baal-Tsur, or "Baal of 
Tyre" — special lord of Tyre — and, as the name 
would indicate, "king of the cit3^" His symbol 
in his temple n.t Gades was an ever-burning fire. 
Coins of Tyre, in the nge of Severus, show the 
fire along with the figure of Hercules, who is 



••■■ Dollinger, Hcidenthum und .Tudcnthum, quoted by Raw- 
linson in "The fetory of Pboeuicia," pp. 115, IIG. 



MY LORD BAAL. l83 

represented with club and lion's skin. In the 
temple at Gades, women were excluded from the 
sacerdotal functions, the garments of the priests 
were of pure white linen and their heads were 
shaven, and swine were not eaten.* There was 
a festival which was observed at Tyre, called 
"the awakening of Hercules," which would indi- 
cate the solar character of the god. 

Moloch, or Milcom, was the god of the Am- 
monites. "The head was that of a bull — a form 
under which, from the story of Europa and the 
Minotaur, it is probable the chief god of Phoenicia 
was represented; the body, human; and the 
stretched-out hands received the child, which 
was consumed in the fire kindled below, while 
the beating of a tabret by the priests drowned 
its cries." f It has been thought that the Israel- 
ites worshiped Moloch in the desert. J The law 
against this worship proves the reality of the 
crime. || Solomon introduced " Moloch, the abom- 
ination of the children of Ammon." (1 Kings 
xi, 7.) In the valley of Tophet these bloody rites 
were celebrated from the time of Solomon to 
Josiah, who defiled the place by appointing it as 
a receptacle for the filth of the city, "that no 
man might make his son or his daughter to pass 

«Kenrick, Phoenicia, pp. 322, 323. tlb. p. 318. 
JAmos V, 26. ||Lev. xx, 2-5. 



184 FIRE FROM S TRANGE ALT A RS. 

through the fire to Moloch." (2 Kings xxiii, 10.) 
In this valley a perpetual fire was kept burning 
to consume the filth cast out from the city.* 
"To pass through the fire" meant to be burned 
in the fire.f "The truth appears to be that two 
motives — an expiatory offering .-md a religious 
consecration — were blended in the sacrifice of 
infants to Moloch; and the readiness, and even 
joy, with which mothers brought them to his 
altars seems inexplicable, except on the supposi- 
tion that they believed themselves to be securing 
their children's eternal happiness by this sacrifice 
of natural feeling." J 

Sanchoniathon says : " It was the custom 
among the ancients, in times of great calamity, 
in order to prevent the ruin of all, for the rulers 
of the city or nation to sacrifice to the avenging 
deities the most beloved of their children, as the 
price of redemption; they who were devoted for 
this purpose were offered mystically." || The 
Carthaginians every year sacrificed a youthful 
victim, whom they chose by lot. After the vic- 
tory of Agathocles, two hundred youths were 
sacrificed. The most acceptable offering among 
the Phoenicians was that of an only child. 



*Matt. V, 22. tCf. Jer. vii, 31 ; xxxii, 35. 
t Kenrick, Phoenicia, pp. 319, 320. 
ilCory, Ancient Fragments, p. 21. 



MY LORD BAAL. 185 

Mothers brought their infants to the brazen im- 
age of Saturn, and quieted them by their caresses 
till they were thrown into the flames. During 
the proconsulate of Tiberius, the priests of these 
unholy rites were hanged on the trees in their 
sacred groves. The Israelites also worshiped 
Chiun, though probably not with infant sacri- 
fices.* Human sacrifices were secretly offered 
even down to the time of Tertullian.")* 

Balak asks Balaam : "Wherewith shall I come 
before the Lord, and bow myself before the high 
God ? Shall I come before him with burnt-offer- 
ings, with calves of a year old ? Will the Lord 
be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten 
thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my 
first-born for the sin of my soul?" (Micah vi, 
6, 7.) It was wdiispered among the Phoenicians 
that the Supreme God himself, with his own 
hand, had slain his only Son as a sacrifice. J 
Both rulers and private individuals might imitate 
this divine example, and there are sad evidences 
that this was sometimes done. Abraham's offer- 
ing of Isaac has great significance in the light 
of the custom of all the peoples among whom 
he dwelt. 

••• Amos V, 26. 

tTertullian, Apologeticus, 9; Ante-Nicene Christian Li- 
brary, Vol. XI, pp. 70, 71. 

t Cory, Aucient Fragments, pp. 19-22. 
16 



II. 

GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 

THE prophet of luxuriant visions says : 
"Tlien he brought me to the door of the 
gate of the Lord's house, which was toward the 
north ; and, behold, there sat women weeping for 
Taramuz." (Ezek. viii, 14.) This was the Greek 
Adonis, especially worshiped at Byblos.* Aph- 
aca was also an important seat of his worship. 
Legend says that he was wounded by a boar on 
Lebanon, and that once a year the stream of 
Byblos was reddened by his blood, " On a cer- 
tain day of the year a globe or star of fire was 
supposed to dart from the summit of Lebanon 
into the river, representing Urania." f The solar 
character of the god is evident. The departure 
of the sun from the upper hemisphere was his 
dea,th, and at the summer solstice he w^as mourned. 
When the mourning was concluded, the image 
of the god was buried. The next day he was 
supposed to come to life, his image was again 



"Josh, xiii, 5; 1 Kings v, 18; Ps. Ixxxiii, 7; Ezek. xxvii, 
9, 29. 

tKenrick, Phcenicia, p. 309. 

186 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 187 

brought forth, and extravagant sorrow was fol- 
lowed by wild rejoicing. The rites at Aphac;i. 
were characterized by every form of abomina- 
tion, and were at last abolished by Constantino. 
The full discussion of these myths would carry 
us far beyond the limits of this work.* 

The Israelites regarded Dagon as a special 
Philistine deity, whose principal seats of worship 
were at Ashdod and Gaza.f His cult was 
widely extended throughout 
Western Asia. Assurnatsir- 
pal ciills himself "the be- 
loved of Ann and Dagon," 
and Sargon declares that he 
"had extended his protection 
Dagon. over the cit}' of Harran, and, 

according to the ordinance of Ann and Dagon, 
had written down their laws. Beth-Dagon was 
a city of Asher, in the neighborhood of Tyre and 
Sidon.J Dagon seems to mean "the exalted 
one;" he has been identified with Mul-lil, and his 
female consort is Dalas or Salas. He has been 
thought to be the fish-god, but in the Assyrian 




® Sozomeu, Ecclesiastical History, II, 5 ; Lenormant, Mem- 
oires du Congres International des Orientalistes, 1st Session, Paris, 
1873, 2d Volume, pp. 149-165 ; Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1887, 
pp. 221-277. 

t Judg. xvi, 23 ; 1 Sam. v, 2-5 ; 1 Chron. x, 10. 

t Josh, xix, 27. 



188 FIRE FROM STRAXGE ALTARS. 

records the form of the fish-god is not distinctly 
connected with Dagon; nor is the Bible clear on 
this point. Tlie fish-god represented on Assyrian 
monuments is described by Berosus : " The whole 
body of the animal was like that of a fish; and 
had under a fish's head another head, and also 
feet below, similar to those of a man, subjoined 
to the fish's tail."* The sculptured figure is de- 
scribed : " The head of the fish forms a miter 
above that of the man, while its scaly back and 
fan-like tail fall as a cloak behind, leaving the 
human feet and limbs exposed ; sometimes a 
human body has appended to it the tail of a 
fish."t 

Nin seems to have been a fish-god among the 
inhabitants of the Mesopotamian territory. Oda- 
con, who appeared subsequent to Oannes and 
expounded his words, may be the same as Dagon. 
While the name has been generally derived from 
da^ — " fish " — Sanchoniathon makes the name 
mean "corn," and hence the god would be an 
agricultural deity. J The obscurity can not be 
wholly dissipated. 

Shemesh was the sun-god, and was also, as we 
have seen, one of the great gods of Assyria. 



*Cory, Ancient Fragments, p. 57. 
tLayard, Nineveh and Babylon, p. 343. 
t Cory, Ancient Fragments, p. 11. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 189 

The name Abed-Shemesli, found in two native 
inscriptions and meaning "servant of Shemesh," 
is proof of the early existence of this cult. Some 
kind of images seems to have been used in his 
worship.* A votive tablet which has been dis- 
covered in Numidia is dedicated to Baal, and 
contains an image of the sun. " There was also 
connected with it a dedication to the sun-god of 
chariots and horses, to which a quasi-divine char- 
acter attached,! so that certain persons were, 
from their birth, consecrated to the sacred horses, 
and given by their parents the name of Abed- 
Busim — 'servant of the horses' — as we find from 
an inscription from Cyprus." | 

Hadad was the name of the king of Edoni 
who had married the sister of Pharaoh's queen. 
Hadad is called the son of Bedad or Ben-Dad. 
Hadad and Dad, as we learn from the inscrip- 
tions, were titles of the supreme Baal of Syria, 
w^hom the Assyrians identified with Bimmon.|| 
Shalmaneser speaks of " the god Dada of Aleppo." 
The name is an abreviated form of Hadad, cur- 
rent amono; the natives of the North. It is the 



■••■■2 Chron. xiv, 5 ; xxxiv, 4. t2 Kings xxiii, 11. 

JEawlinson, The Religions of the Ancient World, pp. 
146, 147. 

II Gen. xxxvi, 35, 36 ; 1 Chron. i, 46, 47 ; 1 Kings xi, 14-25 ; 
2 Sam. viii, 3-12 ; x, 16, 19 ; 1 Chron. xviii, 3, 5, 7, 8-10 ; xix, 
16, 19 ; Zech. xii, 11. 



190 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

san)e word that we find in Be-Dad, Ben-Dad, 
" the son of Dad," the father of the Elamite Ha- 
dad. Dad recurs in the David of the Old Tes- 
tament; and David or Dod, sometimes written 
Dodo, is the masculine corresponding with a 
Phoenician goddess whose name means "the be- 
loved one," and who is called Dido by Roman 
writers. Dido was the presiding deitj of Car- 
thage, whom legend confounded with EUssa, and 
was the consort of the sun-god conceived as 
Tammuz. The Moabite stone shows that the 
Northern Israelites worshiped Dodo or Dod as 
the Supreme God, as well as Yahveh. This was 
perhaps an old title of the Supreme God in the 
Jebusite Jerusalem, w^hom Isaiah calls D6d-i — 
"my beloved."* The original name of David 
may have been Elhanan — " Elhanan, who is Dodo," 
or David. f 

Coins bear the name of Abd-Hadad, "the serv- 
ant of Had ad," who reigned at Mabog in the 
fourth century of the present era. 

The original name of Solomon was Jedidiah, 
which was changed to '' the peaceful one " when 
his father had "peace from all his enemies." 
(2 Sam. xii, 24, 25.) Now, we meet in the in- 
scriptions with Sallimmanu, "the god of peace," 



*■ Isa. V, 1 — Hebrew Bible. 

12 Sam. xxiii, 2-4; cf. 2 Sam. xxi, 19; 1 Chron. xx, 5. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 191 

who may have been a fish-god and even Ea him- 
self. His name was ideographically expressed 
by a fish in a basin of water. In the time of 
figlath-Pileser III, B. C. 732, the Moabite king 
bore the name of Salamanu ; and the image of 
"Sallimmanu the fish, the god of the city of 
Temen-Sallim, ' the foundation of peace/ " stood in 
Assyrian temples. In the age of Shalmaneser 
II, a royal scribe bore the polysjdlabic name of 
Sallimmanu-nunu-sar-ilani or " Solomon the fish 
is king of the gods." 

It has also been shown that Saul was the sun- 
god of Babylon, Savul or Sawul.* 

The names of other old divinities are im- 
bedded in the literature of Palestine. 

The god Anu and the older Ana made their 
way westward at a very early period. Thotmes 
III mentions a Palestinian town, Beth-Anath, 
"the temple of Anat," and there was another 
town of the same name within the borders of the 
tribe of Naphtali. (Josh, xix, 38.) Anathoth 
was a city of priests. (Josh, xxi, 18.) There 
was an Anah or Anat who was the daughter of 
the Hivite Zibeon and mother-in-law of Esau ; 
and Anah or Anu was the son of the Horite 
Zibeon. (Gen. xxxvi, 1, 14, 20.) 

The first king of Edom mentioned in Grenesis 

* Sayce, Hibbert Lectures, 1886, pp. 52, 58. 



192 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

xxxvi is Bela, the son of Beor ; that is, Bileam 
or Balaam, the son of Beor. Neubauer has 
shown that Balaam is Bil-'am, "Baal is Am(mi)," 
and the latter is the supreme god of Ammon. 
We may compare the last syllable in such words 
as Jerobo-am and Rehobo-am. 

The original name of the god of Gudua was 
Nerra or Ner whose throne was in Hades, where 
he sat crowned and awaited the entrance of the 
dead kings of the earth. He ruled over " the 
great city," which was peopled by all the hosts 
of the dead. In Phoenicia he was known as 
Sarrabu, " the great king," and among the Shuites 
on the western bank of the Euphrates he was 
Emu — with which compare the god of the Am- 
monites, named above. 

We have also Samlah of Masrekah, who is 
identified with the Greek Semele. In 1884 a 
Phoenician inscription was discovered in a bay 
to the west of the Peirseos containing the name 
Pen-'Samlath, "the face of 'Samlath." 

We find traces of many gods — Nebo, Sin, 
Rimmon, and others — among the Palestinian 
nations, but can not in this connection grant these 
more particular reference. 

Eshmun, the youngest son of Sadyk, was the 
special god of Berytus. Legend says that while 
Astarte was hunting in the Phoenician forests, 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 193 

she fell in love with this beautiful youth, and 
upon being refused, changed him into a god and 
carried him to heaven. The Greeks identi- 
fied him — we know not on what principle — with 
^sculapius. 

The Cabiri were brothers of Eshmun, but by 
a different mother. Whether they were native 
or foreign may yet remain a question. Kenrick 
believes "that, in their original conception, they 
represented the elements of fire and air, com- 
bined in the idea of flame."* They may be iden- 
tified with the Corybantes, the Curetes, the Idaei 
Dactyli, and the Telchines, and are represented 
in the costume of blacksmiths. They were 
the reputed sons of Hephaistus — the same as 
those small and misshapen and yet powerful 
deities common to many mythologies, to whom 
the discovery and working of metals have been 
ascribed. Figures on Phoenician coins, especially 
those from Cossyra, holding a hammer in one 
hand and a serpent in the other, and wearing a 
smith's apron, are supposed to represent the 
Cabiri, To these deities has been ascribed the 
invention of ships, and they were recognized as 
the lords of sailors. Herodotus saw their images 
on the prows of Phoenician vessels. The origin 
of the Cabiri myths, their migrations, modifica- 

* Cory, Ancient Fragments, p. 10 ; Kenrick, Phoenicia, p. 327, 
17 



1 94 FIRE FROM STRANGE A L TA RS. 

tions, and intricate connections, are problems so 
delicate and involved that we may never hope 
for satisfactory explanations.* The name of 
Eshmunazar, which has become so historic, and 
many others preserved in Phoenician inscrip- 
tions — Bar-Eshmun, Han-Eshmun, Eshmun-itten, 
Abed-Eshmun, Netsil-Eshmun, and others — con- 
tain the name of the god as a component. 

The goddess Onca, who gave name to one of 
the gates of Thebes, was Phoenician. Nonnus 
calls her " the blue-eyed Mene." She seems to 
have been worshiped in the Acropolis of Athens 
under the title of Polias. Her image was erected 
at Onca in Boeotia by Cadmus, and she was also 
worshiped at Corinth. She may be compared 
with the warHke goddess Athene. 

The Phoenicians had no deity corresponding 
with Neptune, except as they came in contact 
with foreign nations. Cadmus was said to have 
founded a temple to Neptune in Rhodes and 
an altar in Thera. Hanno founded such a 
temple on the promontory of Solocis. Hamilcar, 
after a great defeat in Sicily, sacrificed a child 
to Saturn, and offered victims to Neptune. A 
Greek inscription found at Athens records the 



*Kenrick, Phoenicia, pp. 326, 328; Lenormant, Beginnings 
of History, pp. 146, et seq. ; Rawlinson, Herodotus, Vol. II, p. 
82, and elsewhere ; Hora<je, Carmina, I, 3, 2 ; III, 29, 64. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 



195 



annual oiferings which Tyrian merchants and 
seamen presented to this god. The Phalerians 
disputed with the Phoenicians the right to his 
priesthood. "His image is found on the coins 
of Cavteia and on those of Berytus, but with 
Grecian attributes, and of the Roman age ; yet 
his worship, along with 
the costume of the 
armed Minerva, is said 
by Herodotus to have 
come from the borders 
of the Lake Tritonis in 
Africa, and it is diffi- 
cult to conceive by 



whom, except by the 
Phoenicians, it should 
have been established 
there among the native 
nomad tribes."* 

Osiris worship was 
adopted by the Phoeni- 
cians, as appears by the 
representations on the ^°'°°' 

coins of Gaulos. Amon, under the form "Ham- 
mon," is found attached as an epithet to Baal on 
votive tablets. Tanith enjoyed still wider recog- 
nition among Phoeniciaa settlers at Carthage, in 

* Kenrick, Phoenicia, p. 326. 




196 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Cyprus, at Athens and, elsewhere, and probably 
came from the Enst. The whole number of 
Phoenician gods, including those of foreign adop- 
tion, was not great. 

The deities of early Phoenician worship were 
not, in the earliest limes, represented by images. 
The ever-burning fire, and certain conical stones 
called baeti/li, were employed ;is symbols, and the 
latter even received a sort of worship. Some- 
times pillars of metal, stone, or wood, were phiced 
in front of the temple. The wooden pillar was 
called Asliera, translated in the authorized ver- 
sion of the Bible as "grove." It symbolized 
Astarte, and is the descendant of the sacred tree 
in early Assyrian art, which may be traced back 
to the sacred tree of Eden. " At festive seasons 
they seem to have been adorned with boughs of 
trees, flowers, and ribbons, and to have formed the 
central object of a worship which was of a sen-: 
sual and debasing character." * 

The worship consisted of prayer, praise, and 
sacrifices, when the victims were usually wholly 
consumed on the altar. Deities Avere also hon- 
ored by libations of wine and smoke of incense. 
At the frequent festivals the sacrifices were some- 
times celebrated on a large scale. Circumcisicm 
was practiced until the Phoenicians came in con- 

® Kawlinson, The Religions of the Ancient World, p. 157. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 197 

tact with foreign nations. According to Sancho- 
niathon, Chrysor '^ exercised himself in words, 
and charms, and divinations."* The ancient in 
habitants of Palestine not only worshiped on high 
places, but also held certain trees and fountains 
in highest estimation. * 

The tablet of Marseilles, discovered in 1845, 
fixes the prices of various sacrificial victims. 
The ox, the bullock, the stag, the sheep, the goat, 
the lamb, the kid, the fawn, the wild bird, and 
the tame bird, are the victims which are named. 
There is also mention of the first-born of ani- 
mals ; and there are meal-off'erings, offerings with 
oil, and offerings of cakes, milk, and fat. An 
honorary portion of the ox, and other similar 
offerings, was presented to the god ; the priest 
received a prescribed portion, " but the skin and 
the haunches and the feet, and the rest of the 
flesh, belong to the offerer." When the poor man 
brought his offering, whether of cattle or of birds, 
the priest was to exact no portion. The sacri- 
fice was to be perfect and pure — nothing leprous, 
scabby, or lean was allowed. No one was per- 
mitted to taste of the blood of the dead victim. 
The priest who would accept other besides the pre- 
scribed offerings, and the offerer who did not pay 
for his offerings, were punished. A tablet from 

* Cory, Ancient Fragments, pp. 7, 8. 



198 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Cyprus gives the disbursements of the priests of 
the temple, in which are mentioned — besides arch- 
itects, guardians, overseers, tenders of cattle, 
masons, masters of the days, scribes, and sing- 
ers — boys, bakers, and even dogs with their 
•young.* 

The Phoenician temple — ^judging from the re- 
mains of those at Paphos in Cyprus, and in Malta 
and Gozo, and the descriptions given in classical 
writers of the temple of Melkarth at Tyre — was 
situated within an inclosure forming open-air 
courts, often ornamented by porticoes of wood. 
The temple itself ''was an open vestibule in a 
facade or pylon, much higher than the rest of 
the building. There was first a sanctuary, where 
were made the oblations ; and then a second 
sanctuary, more retired, a holy of holies, where 
the laity, and even the majority of the priests, 
were not allowed to enter. Waiting-rooms were 
placed all round." In the most retired holy 
place were kept the symbols of the divinity. 
Such was the temple at Tyre, and other sanctu- 
aries had the same essential j)arts.f 

Open-air worship doubtless preceded all sacred 



*Cf. Jer. xliv, 15-19; Deut. xxiii, 18; Lev. xlx, 27; xxi, 5; 
Sayce, Fresh Light from the Ancient jNIonuments, pp. 79-84. 

tLenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. II, pp. 
229, 230. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 199 

buildings, and the early shrines were very simple 
structures ; perhaps no more than a small cell for 
the reception of an image of the god, open on 
one side, before which the faithful could offer 
prayers and sacrifices. " The Maahed of Amrit 
or Marathus is a specimen, almost complete, of 
this earliest kind of temple. In tlie living rock 
a quadrangle, one hundred and ninety-two feet 
long by one hundred and sixty broad, has been 
cut and smoothed into a nearly flat area. In the 
middle of this space has been left a portion of 
the natural rock, a block some twenty feet square 
and ten feet high. Upon this cubical mass, 
which is one with the floor of the inclosure, has 
been built, of separate stones, a small shrine or 
tabernacle, fifteen feet long by twelve feet broad 
and fourteen feet high. The walls are made of 
three layers of hewn stone, and the roof of a 
single block. The only external ornament is a 
fillet and cornice along the four sides of the roof, 
and the only internal one a slight vaulting of the 
otherwise flat stone by which the chamber is 
covered in. No steps or staircase lead . up into 
the chamber, and it is difficult to understand how 
it was entered. Perhaps it was built merely to 
contain an image of a deity, before which wor- 
shipers in the court below prostrated themselves. 
Two other very similar shrines were discovered 



200 FIRE FROM S TRA NGE ALTA RS. 

by M. Renan, in the neighborhood of the Maabed, 
and are figured in his great work."* 

The temple of Byblos is represented on coins 
by which it is shown that the court was screened 
by a portico, which protected the worshipers from 
sun and rain. 

The tomb of Hiram — it may have been the 
actual sepulcher of this great king — is about 
three miles distant from the modern Tyre. The 
pedestal consists of three courses of gray lime- 
stone, each three feet thick, the uppermost 
slightly overhanging the others. The sarcoph- 
agus placed upon this foundation is twelve 
feet long by six feet broad and six feet high, 
and is formed out of a single stone. The lid is 
a solid block, three feet in thickness. Unfortu- 
nately, as is the case with the great majority of 
structures of similar character, the tomb has 
been rifled. 

At some distance from the coast opposite 
Aradus there stand four monuments or tombs, in 
a good condition of preservation. One of these 
has been described as a "real masterpiece in re- 
spect of proportion, elegance, and majesty." The 
basement-story consists of four blocks of stone, 
is circular in form, and is adorned by four stone 
lions, whose heads and fore-quarters project from 

*Rawlinson, The Story of Phcenieia, pp. 252, 253. 



60DS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 201 

the mass. Two stories above are cylindrical, the 
upper being smaller and concentric, and are 
formed of a single stone. The whole is sur- 
mounted by a dome. A row of carved crenela- 
tions, round the summit of each of the stories of 
the double cylinder, constitutes the sole decora- 
tion. The height of the monument is thirty-two 
feet. The tomb-chamber beneath is reached from 
an entrance at some little distance, a flight of 
fifteen steps leading down to a descending pas- 
sage about twenty-five feet long. The main 
chamber, twenty feet square and nine feet in 
height, leads to two chambers in the same direc- 
tion and parallel to each other, each containing 
on either side niches for coffins — eight in all. 
The whole has been hewn from the solid rock. 

The other tombs of this group are less happy 
in design. One of them is built of large blocks 
in five courses, and contains the sepulchral cham- 
bers within its own mass. The stones of the 
lowest course are beveled, and all are laid with- 
out cement. There was originally a cornice, 
above which rose a pyramid. The whole was 
about fifty-three feet in height. 

Tombs have been discovered elsewhere, and 
are generally subterranean chambers pierced in 
the rock, in the walls of which, in oven-like re- 
cesses, were the embalmed bodies of the dead. 



202 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

The sarcophagus of Esmunazar, king of Sid on, 
whose mother was priestess of Ashtoreth, was 
discovered in 1855, and furnishes the longest 
Phoenician inscription. He says, in this inscrip- 
tion: "We built the temple of the Adonim (the 
great gods) at Sidon on the sea-shore, and all- 
powerful Heaven has made Ashtoreth favorable 
to us. We also have built on the mountain 
a temple to Eshmun, whose hand rests on a ser- 
pent. Lastly, we also built the temples of the 
Adonim of Sidon, at Sidon, of tlie Baal of Sidon, 
and of Ashtoreth — the glory of Baal." Again he 
says : " When I fall asleep, at the end of my 
days, then let there be rest, caring for the dead. 
And I shall lie in this stone coffin, and in this 
grave, at the place which I have built, founding 
an ornament for the whole kingdom. And let 
not any man open this resting-place, nor let him 
seek for treasure with us, for with us no treas- 
ure shall be placed ; neither let him take away 
the stone coffin where I lie, nor let him over- 
weight the strength of this coffin by laying a 
second coffin upon it. But if a man sells our 
grave he is made a curse to himself, we banish 
him out of the whole kingdom; and any man 
who opens the lid of this grave, or who removes 
the stone coffin in which I lie, or who overloads 
the support of this coffin, may God deny him a 



\ 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 203 

resting-place for his soul, and let him not be 
buried in his grave! May God make him with- 
out son or name! Instead of him sleeping, may 
he quake before the mighty, before the holy, and 
before them that shall follow him!"* 

The great sepulcher discovered in the vicinity 
of Beyrout in 1887, consists of several exca- 
vated chambers in which were many sarcophagi, 
some of which were plain, but some so richly 
ornamented, and exhibiting so great artistic 
skill, as to command unqualified praise. Most of 
these tombs had been rifled; but, fortunately, two 
or three had not been violated. The royal sar- 
cophagus furnishes an important Phoenician in- 
scription, in eight lines, which has been translated 
as follows: "I, Tabnit, priest of Ashtoreth and 
king of Sidon, son of Ezmunazar, priest of Ash- 
toreth and king of Sidon, lying in this tomb, 
say : ' Come not to open my tomb ; there is here 
neither gold, nor silver, nor treasure. He who 
will open this tomb shall have no prosperity 
under the sun, and even in the grave shall not 
find repose.'" f 

Votive statues were placed in the temples, 



*Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. II, p. 197; 
Rule, Oriental Records Historical, pp. 11, 12; Oppert, Rec- 
ords of the Past, Vol. IX, pp. 111-114. 

t Rawlinson, The Story of Phoenicia, p. 269. 



204 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

and there were numerous idols for private wor- 
ship. The idols were made of stone, baked 
earth, and bronze. The images of the gods 
were sometimes carried to the field of battle.* 
Chemosh leads Mesha, king of Moab, in his mil- 
itary campaigns, fights his battles, and gains his 
victories. To Chemosh the king offers the ves- 
sels of Jehovah captured in war, and to Ashtar- 
Chemoth he devotes the women and maidens. 
The Moabite stone, only recently discovered, was 
called "a stone of salvation." f The king could 
say of his national god : " He saved me from 
all despoilers, and let me see my desire upon all 
my enemies." J 

It is believed that the descendants of Ca- 
naanites are still to be found in Palestine, " and 
that their strange and heathenish observances, so 
tenaciously held in secrecy, but known to include 
the worship of the sun and moon, are relics of 
the Old-world idolatry." The peasants, or Fel- 
lahin, "are in reality Canaanites by descent, and 
still retain their ancient religion, thinly veneered 
with Mussulman compliances. Personal local 
divinities are still worshiped as in the cult of 



* Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. II, pp. 230, 
231 ; 2 Sam. v, 21. 

t Cf. 1 Sam. vii, 12. 

X Ginsburg, Records of the Past, Vol. XI, pp. 165-168. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTERS. 205 

the primitive Canaanites." * Modern survivals 
assist in the solution of many old problems. 

The judgment pronounced upon this old re- 
ligion has been uniformly unfavorable. Movers 
defines it as "an apotheosis of the forces and 
laws of nature, an adoration of the objects in 
which these forces were seen, and where they 
appeared most active." Lenormant adds : 
" Round this religious system gathered in the 
external and public worship a host of frightful 
debaucheries, orgies, and prostitutions, in honor 
of the deities, such as we have already described 
at Babylon, and which accompanied all the nat- 
uralistic rehgions of antiquity. The Canaanites 
were remarkable for the atrocious cruelty that 
stamped all the ceremonies of their worship and 
the precepts of their religion. No other people 
ever rivaled them in the mixture of bloodshed 
and debauchery with which they thought to honor 
the deity." Creuzer says of this faith: "Terror 
was the inherent principle of this religion ;. all 
its rites were blood-stained, and all its ceremo- 
nies were surrounded with gloomy images. 
When we consider the abstinences, the voluntary 
tortures, and, above all, the horrible sacrifices 
imposed as a duty on the living, we no longer 



*Tomkins, Times of Abraham, p. 93; Conder, Tent-Work 
in Palestine, Vol. II, p. 222. 



206 PIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

wonder that they envied the repose of the dead. 
This religion silenced all the best feelings of hu- 
man nature, degraded men's minds by a supersti- 
tion alternately cruel and profligate, and we may 
seek in vain for any influence for good it could 
have exercised on the nation." * Rawlinson says : 
"Altogether, the religion of the Phoenicians, 
while possessing some redeeming points, as the 
absence of images and a deep sense of sin which 
led them to sacrifice what was nearest and dear- 
est to them to appease the divine anger, must be 
regarded as one of the lowest nnd most debasing 
of the forms of belief and worship prevalent in 
the ancient world, combining, as it did, impurity 
with cruelty, the sanction of licentiousness with 
the requirement of bloody rites, revolting to the 
conscience, and destructive of any right appre- 
hension of the true idea of God."f Mommsen 
declares : " The religious conceptions of the 
Phoenicians were rude and uncouth, and it seemed 
as if their worship was meant to foster rather 
than to restrain lust and cruelty." J And Lenor- 
mant says again : "All the atrocities of the 
Phoenician worship were practiced at Carthage, 



*Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. II, pp. 
222, 223. 

t Rawlinson, The Religions of the Ancient World, p. 158. 
t Mommsen, History of Rome, Vol. II, p. 10. 



GODS, AND OTHER MATTE US. 207 

particularly the burning of children. These bar- 
barous sacrifices took place every year, and 
were frightfully multiplied on the occasion of 
public calamities, in order to appease the wrath 
of the gods. In every place where the Car- 
thaginians carried their trade and their arms, 
not only at fixed periods, but at all critical con- 
junctions, their fanaticism celebrated these hor- 
rible sacrifices." * 



*Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. II, p. 280. 



III. 



SIjB Jaiflj nf tljB pijaranlj0. 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 

IT is very difficult to do justice to a heathen 
religion. The attention is attracted to the 
ritualistic services — temples, priests, offerings, 
chants, prayers, processions, symbols, formulie, 
prostrations, and genuflections ; we study the 
meanings and forms of words, our minds are pre(^c- 
cupied with our own religious ideas, and what we 
think religion ought to be ; but the spirit, the 
soul of the religion which we study, we are too 
apt to miss. Difficulties multiply when we inquire 
concerning the religion of a race separated from 
our own by great differences of blood, radically 
distinct in language, and removed in history by 
thousand of years and a quadrant of the globe. 
We know not the meanings they attach to words. 
We can not think as they think and feel as they 
feel. To appreciate properly any strange religion, 
especially any beggarliest religion of any lowest 
race, a man must be a genuine lover of hu- 
manity, and an unprejudiced and earnest, a sin- 
cere and diligent, inquirer. He must completely 
divest himself of the idea that any religion ex- 
ists, or ever has existed, which is all a sham or 

211 



21 2 FIRE FROM STRANGE A L TARS. 

meaningless, or an invention of crafty priests or 
more crafty evil spirits. He must be ready to 
recognize something good in every religion, some 
pure gold, though perhaps in the midst of much 
rubbish. Any lowest and basest religion is not a 
fit subject for ridicule. It should be treated 
with reverence, and the student should feel that 
it is holy ground upon which he treads. All na- 
tions feel after God, if haply they may find 
him. Their religion is to them all their comfort 
and hope and life, and in some poor measure 
satisfies the deep longings of their souls to lean 
on the bosom of the Eternal. Then, too, many 
of these religions have been proclaimed by earnest 
souls to whom the All-Father seems to have 
vouchsafed special illumination. That which is 
most objectionable in heathen religions, is the 
accumulated traditions and distortions of cen- 
turies. 

That which most attracted the attention of the 
Greeks and early Christians when brought into 
contact with the Egyptians was the worship of 
animals, such as the cat, the dog, the fish, the 
ape, the owl, the jackal, the snake, the bug, and 
the ram. But the absurdities, so glaring at first, 
disappeared as they became better acquainted 
with the system. Philo of Alexandria was com- 
pelled to acknowledge that laughter at the re- 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 213 

ligion of Egypt was too apt to end in conversion 
wrought by its overpowering influence. 

The animals which were worshiped were not 
fetishes, but symbols of the deities ; and certainly 
they were more appropriate symbols than stocks 
and stones. And animal worship was not the 
only worship. Various deities were named 
Osiris, Isis, Anion, Thoth, and many others; and 
some, indeed many, true and noble ideas were 
held concerning these gods; yea, underneath all, 
from time to time, we may see struggling forth 
the doctrine of the one God. 

" No religion can be studied with profit ex- 
cept in the words of its votaries." But what 
shall we say when the language of the race has 
been dead for thousands of years, when no man 
living can read a word of it, when even the let- 
ters are as unknown as though they really meant 
nothing, and when its whole literature is shut up 
in such a language and such an alphabet? Such 
was the condition of knowledge concerning the 
Egyptian language and literature at a period no 
more remote than the beginning of the present 
century. No man living knew the meaning of a 
word, nor could any living man sound a letter. 
The discovery of the Rosetta Stone, bearing the 
same inscription in a hieroglyphic, a demotic, 
and a Greek text — a stone erected in honor of 



214 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Ptolemy Epiphanes one hundred and ninety- 
three years before Christ, and now preserved in 
the British Museum — furnished Champollion with 
the key for the decipherment of the ancient 
Egyptian language. Other scholars — Lepsius, 
Birch, Hincks, Brugsch, Rouge, and many more — 
have worked successfully in this field. 

Many Egyptian texts have been published in 
facsimile, and the number of unpublished texts 
is almost innumerable. Five folio volumes of 
texts have been published which were taken from 
the temple of Denderah alone, and yet others re- 
mained uncopied. Renouf, in speaking of the 
vast number of inscriptions, says : " I had the 
pleasure of passing some time, one or two years 
ago, at Qurna, on the left bank of the Nile, near 
Thebes, with a great scholar, who had spent 
much time in copying the inscriptions of a single 
tomb ; but though he worked indefatigably and 
rapidly, he was compelled to come away, leaving 
a great part of his intended work unaccom- 
plished." * 

Time and the vandalism of travelers work 
sad havoc among these precious and venerable 
records of old Egypt. Memphis, Thebes, On, 
and other cities are no more. Mummy-cases 



* Eenouf, The Religion of Ancient Egypt, pp. 24, 25. 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 215 

and coffins bearing inscriptions have furnished 
fuel for centuries, papyri of great value have 
been lost. Yet, notwithstanding this destruc- 
tion, we possess more material, and that which 
is more trustworthy, for the study of the religion 
of ancient Egypt, than all that remains to us 
for the study of the religions of Greece and 
Rome. Indeed, all that is left to us of the 
Egyptian literature is religious, or pervaded by 
a religious spirit. Royal palaces and political 
monuments have perished, while temples and 
tombs covered with prayers and litanies remain, 
and papyri of sacred writings have been pre- 
served for at least three or four thousand years. 
The Egyptians were a most religious nation, and 
we may thank the disinterested enthusiasm of 
Egyptologers that their language is putting on a 
modern garb in modern tongues, and we may now 
read in translations the thoughts which stirred 
the hearts of the Pharaohs of old, perhaps a 
thousand years before Moses stood on the bank 
of the Nile. The Egyptian language is closely 
related to the Coptic, which is its direct de- 
scendant. Some of the papyrus manuscripts may 
be more than four thousand years old. They 
" have been preserved by being kept from the 
air and damp in a perfectly dry climate, her- 
metically sealed in earthen or wooden vessels, or 



216 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

under mummy coverings, sometimes at a depth 
of ninety feet within the living rock, and still 
further protected by a thick covering of the 
pure, dry sand of the desert." 

The literature of Egypt, though not to be 
compared with the literatures of Greece and 
Rome and several modern countries, yet possesses 
an interest of its own which has commanded the 
profound study of many noble minds. The style 
of the prose composition is frequently cramped, 
stilted, forced, dry, bald, obscure, and forbidding. 
As well might one turn to a table of loga- 
rithms for refreshment. The man who can read- 
it through^ inspired by no other interest than 
the literary finish, is a hero and a martyr. There 
are insufferable self-laudation of kings, grandilo- 
quent accounts of victories, and endless lists of 
articles of tribute and spoils of war, ad nauseam, 

" Poetry was in a more advanced condition. 
Like the Hebrew poetry, it delighted in parallel- 
isms and antitheses, while it transcended He- 
brew poetry in its rhythmic arrangement, in the 
balance of the lines, the close correspondence of 
clause to clause, and the strict observance of 
rhythmic law in most cases."* 

In some compositions there are a simplicity 
which is more than childish, a confusion which 



"■Kawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, Vol. I, pp. 136, 137. 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 217 

is insoluble, and an obscurity which is absolutely 
impenetrable. A better judgment, however, may 
probably be pronounced when the language is 
better understood. 

The Egyptian literature, such as it is, is quite 
voluminous. Those who are best qualified to 
pronounce an opinion, declare that it rivals in 
extent any other ancient literature. Many vol- 
umes of translations have already been published 
in modern tongues, and the work is even now 
but fairly begun. The variety of subjects treated 
is remarkable — religion, history, theology, poetry, 
travels, epistolary correspondence; military, legal, 
police, and statistical reports ; complaints, peti- 
tions, treaties, orations, love-songs, morality, rhet- 
oric, mathematics, medicine, geography, astron- 
omy, astrology, magic, proverbs, calendars, 
receipts, accounts, catalogues of libraries, and 
various other works. 

The religious works, as has been already re- 
marked, are among the most important, and 
among these the chief place must be assigned to 
"The Book of the Dead." This book, which 
claims to be a revelation of the god Thoth, de- 
clares the will of the gods and reveals divine 
mysteries. Thoth himself, the god of letters, is 
said to have written certain important portions. 
Extracts were placed in the coffins, on the inner 

19 



218 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

sides of the chests, on the inner walls of the 
tombs, on the linen wrappings of the mummies , 
or, again, especially in the time of the later Pha- 
raohs, copies of important chapters were written 
on papyrus and deposited with the dead. This 
sacred use of the holy writings was known as 
early as the eleventh dynasty. 

The Book of the Dead was a work of slow 
growth. Several of the chapters are very an- 
cient, while additions were made from time to 
time during many centuries. These ndditions 
themselves were frequently ancient productions. 
The Book of the Dead, then, is a colleclion of 
works, more or less ancient, all treating upon the 
same important subject — the experience of the 
soul beyond this present life. 

The tomb of Bekenrenef, or Petamonemapt, 
of the twenty-sixth dynasty, is excavated in the 
rock over nearly an acre and a quarter of ground, 
and every square inch of the Avail is covered 
with sculptured selections from this book. The 
Turin papyrus, the longest which has been dis- 
covered, contains one hundred and sixty-five 
chapters. This is not the whole work, since 
chapters not contained in this papyrus are met 
with in other manuscripts. 

The first sixteen chapters consist of prayers 
and invocations, which are to be used from the 



LANGUAGE AXD LITERATURE. 219 

moment of death to the commencement of the 
embalming process. At the Aery moment of 
death, the soul separated from the body ad- 
dresses the deity of Hades, presents his claims 
to favor, and asks admittance to the realm of 
the departed. The chorus of glorified souls sup- 
port his prayer. Osiris answers : " Fear nothing 
in making thy prayer to me for the immortality 
of thy soul, and that I may give permission for 
thee to pass the threshold." The soul, strength- 
ened by this assurance, enters the land of the 
dead. He now, for the first time, sees the sun 
in the lower hemisphere, and is dazzled by its 
glory. He sings to the sun a hymn of praise. 

The journeys of the soul in the lower region 
must now begin; but first there must be granted 
the divine provision of knowledge, as the nour- 
ishment needful to sustain and strengthen it in 
its long wanderings. 

The seventeenth chapter is the Egyptian 
faith, and is most mystical and quite unintelli- 
gible. There is a large vignette, with a series 
of symbols, sacred, mysterious, and obscure, ac- 
companied with explanations equally mysterious 
and obscure. We meet now with prayers to be 
said while the body is being rolled in its wrap- 
pings, in which allusions are made to the con- 
flicts of Osiris with Typhon, the demon of dark- 



220 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

ness, invoking the aid of Thoth, the conductor 
of souls, against the black demon. The body of 
the deceased is wrapped in its coverings, while 
the soul is supplied with the food of knowledge. 
But hitherto the deceased can not move a step. 
He prays to the gods, and they restore the use 
of his limbs and all his faculties as during life. 
The soul now starts on his long and perilous 
wanderings. The sacred scarabseus will be his 
sufficient passport. He places this over his 
heart, and is permitted to pass through the 
gloomy portal. His journey is no pleasant pas- 
time. Frightful monsters — crocodiles, serpents, 
reptiles of many forms — surround him, and seek 
his life. They are the servants of Typhon, and 
have no mercy. They glare upon him ; they at- 
tack him; they seek to devour him; they ad- 
dress him in insulting speeches. He defends 
himself with his spear; he lashes his enemies 
with his tongue ; he resorts to all-powerful magic 
formulae. He calls out: '' serpent Rerek ! ad- 
vance not! The gods Seb and Shu are my pro- 
tection. Stop ! thou who hast eaten the rat which 
the sun-god abhors, and hast chewed the bones 
of a rotten cat !" He cries to the crocodile : 
" Back ! Crocodile of the West ! who livest upon 
the Achemu who are at rest ; what thou abhor- 
rest is upon me ; I have eaten the head of Osiris ; 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 221 

I am Set. Back ! Crocodile of the West ! there 
is an asp upon me ; I shall not be given to thee ; 
dart not thy flame upon me ! Back ! Crocodile 
of the East ! who feedest upon impurities ; what 
thou abhorrest is upon me ; I have passed ; I am 
Osiris ;" and so on. He prays : " Ra, in thine 
egg, radiant in thy disk, shining forth from the 
horizon, swimming over the steel firmament, sail- 
ing over the pillars of Shu, thou who hast no 
second among the gods, who producest the winds 
by the flames of thy mouth, and who enlight- 
enest the worlds with thy splendors, save the 
departed from that god whose nature is a mys- 
tery, and whose eyebrows are as the arms of the 
balance, on the night when Aauit was weighed." 
" lord of victory in the two worlds, . . . 
save the Osiris from that god who seizes upon 
souls, devours hearts, and feeds upon carcasses." 
The soul is aided by the gods, conquers all his 
enemies, forces his passage through the midst of 
defeated monsters; and, feeling that all the gods 
severally haA'-e taken possession of the different 
members of his body, and by so doing have made 
him invincible in battle, he raises to them a song 
of triumph. 

And his is no small triumph. Had he gone 
astray in the desert, he would have died of 
hunger and thirst. Had he yielded to his foes, 



222 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

a most horrible fate would have awaited him. 
But he has conquered, and is safe, but exhausted. 
He rests, recruits his strength, and is prepared 
for further advancement. 

He talks with Divine Light, who instructs 
him and becomes his guide as he proceeds on his 
wondrous way. A series of transformations, 
which he can assume at will, enables him to 
escape his enemies, and identifies him with noble, 
divine symbols. He is successively a hawk, an 
angel, a lotus, the god Ptah, a heron, a crane, a 
human-headed bird, a swallow, a serpent, a 
crocodile. Meantime the body has been carefully 
preserved by embalming. The soul seems here- 
tofore to have traveled as a shade. He is now 
joined again with his body. He passes through 
the dwelling of Thoth, and that god gives him 
a book to read along the way. It contains im- 
portant secrets, which he will need before the 
end of his trial. He reaches the banks of a 
subterranean stream, beyond which are the Elysian 
Fields. But here he meets with a new and 
unexpected danger. A disguised boatman has 
been sent by Typhon to allure him, if possible, 
from his way. Happily he discovers the villainy 
of his enemy, and drives away the boatman, 
heaping upon him deserved reproaches. He finds 
the right boat at last. The boatman subjects 



LANOUAOE AND LITERATURE. 223 

him to a severe examination, to determine 
whether he possesses the necessary quahfications 
to enable him successfully to make the proposed 
voyage. He acquits himself well in the exam- 
ination. Each part of the boat seems to have 
become animate and to have found a tongue. 
To the twenty-three parts severally, in answer 
to the questions which they ask, he gives their 
names and the mystical meanings therewith con- 
nected. He is permitted to embark ; the boat- 
man takes him across the mystic river ; he 
stands in the Elysian Fields. He is conducted 
by Anubis through many windings of a labyrinth, 
and reaches the judgment-hall of Osiris, where he 
will receive his final sentence. One hundred and 
eight chapters of the Book of the Dead have 
been employed in this second part. The severest 
ordeal is at hand. The soul stands in the Hall 
of Truth. Osiris, the judge of the dead, is 
seated on a lofty throne. Forty-two assessors 
are present. Anubis, "the director of the 
weight," brings forth the balance. The forty- 
two accusers are represented as standing above 
the balance. In one scale of the balance is 
placed the image of Maat, or Righteous Law, and 
in the other scale of the balance is placed a vase 
containing the virtues or the heart of the deceased. 
Thoth stands near, watching the indicator of 



224 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the balance, and ready, pen in hand, to write 
the result in his book. The forty-two terrible 
assessors begin the trial. Their heads are chiefly 
those of animals — the lion, the jackal, the hawk, 
the ram, the crocodile, the hippopotamus. They 
live by catching the wicked, feeding upon their 
blood, and devouring their hearts. Each of the 
assessors, bearing a mystical name, questions the 
soul. He tells the symbolic name of each, and 
tells its meaning. Among the names are " eyes 
of flame," " breath of flame," "cracker of bones," 
" devourer of shades," " eater of hearts," " swal- 
lower," and so on. The soul must also answer, 
in a presence so fearful and august, questions 
most searching concerning his life, and to declare 
his innocence with respect to forty- two classes 
of sins. To the assessors severally he proclaims 
his blameless life: "I have not blasphemed; I 
have not deceived ; I have not stolen ; I have 
not slain any one treacherously ; I have not been 
cruel to any one; I have not caused disturbance; 
I have not been idle; I have not been drunken; 
I have not issued unjust orders; I have not been 
indiscreetly curious ; I have not multiplied words 
in speaking ; I have struck no one ; I have not 
eaten my heart through envy ; I have not 
reviled the face of the king, nor the face of my 
father ; I have not made false accusations ; I 



LAXGUAGE AND LITERATURE, 225 

have not kept milk from the mouth of sucklings ; 
I have not caused abortion ; I have not ill-used 
my slaves ; I have not killed sacred beasts ; I 
have not defiled the river ; I have not polluted 
myself; I have not taken the clothes of the 
dead." Addressing the awful conclave, he boldly 
says : " Let me go ; ye know that I am without 
fault, without evil, without sin, without crime. 
Do not torture me ; do not aught against me. 
I have lived on truth ; I have been fed on truth. 
I have made it my delight to do what men com- 
mand and the gods approve. I have offered to 
the deities all the sacrifices that were their due. 
I have given bread to the hungry, and drink 
to him that was athirst; I have clothed the 
naked with garments. . . . My mouth nnd 
my hands are pure." He also declares that he 
has not hindered the irrigation of the soil from 
the river and canals ; that he has never injured 
the stones for mooring vessels on the Nile ; that he 
has never altered prescribed prayeis ; and that 
he has never touched any of the sacred property, 
never fished for sacred fish, and never stolen 
offerings from the altar. The great tribunal 
listen to this apology. The forty-two assessors 
pronounce his knowledge sufficient; his heart is 
weighed in the balance ; Osiris pronounces his 
final judgment; his home is among the blest. 



226 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Forty chapters, mystical and obscure, describe 
the further progress of the happy soul. In the 
boat of the sun, he goes forth through the 
regions of heaveil. "Afterwards the Ritual rises 
to a higher poetical flight, even contemplating the 
identification of the deceased with the symbolic 
figure comprising all the attributes of the deities 
of the Egyptian pantheon." 

The good soul does not at once obtain perfect 
bliss, but is purged of his infirmities in a fire 
guarded by four ape-faced genii, becomes the 
companion of Osiris for three thousand years, 
returns to earth, enters his former body, rises 
from the dead, and lives again a human life. 
This process is repeated "through a mystic cycle 
of years when at last the soul reaches a stage 
which it is sometimes difficult to distinguish from 
absorption in the divine essence. 

The wicked man passes away from the judg- 
ment-seat, and is purified through many trans- 
migrations ; or, if he is incorrigible, he becomes 
a prey to the terrible hippopotamus-headed 
monster, and is decapitated by Horus and Smu 
on the block of Hades. 

It will be remembered that the Book of the 
Dead is not a systematic treatise, but rather a 
collection of works of different ages and various 
authorship. To make out our history of the 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 227 

progress of the soul in the lower world we have 
neglected, to a great extent, the fact that these 
chapters supplement and overlap each other in a 
manner quite confusing. We may rely, however, 
upon the main results of the discussion. Several 
of the statements — as the return of the soul to a 
worldly life, and the purification of the wicked 
who are not incorrigible — may need modifi- 
cation."* 

There are several other important religious 
works to which we must make some reference. 
We have already spoken of the Lamentations of 
Isis and Nephthis.f The Book of Glorifying 
Osiris in Aquerti, contained in a papyrus of the 
Louvre, is very similar in character. Isis and 
Nephthis speak as follows : " Come to thine 
abode, come to thine abode, God An, come to 
thine abode ; good bull, the lord of all men who 
love thee and all women; god of the beautiful 
countenance, who residest in Aquerti. Ancient 
one among those of the sacred West. Are not 
all hearts swelling with love of thee, Unne- 
fer! . . . Gods and men raise their hands 
in search of thee, as a son seeketh his mother. 

* Lenormant, Ancient History of the East, Vol. I, pp. 308-314, 
322 ; Rawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, Vol. I, pp. 140-144, 
327-329 ; Eenouf, The Religion of Ancient Egypt, pp. 179-208 ; 
Tiele, Egyptian Religion, pp. 22-32. 
t See chapter vii. 



228 FIRE FROM STRANG'S ALTARS. 

Come to them whose hearts are sick ; grant to 
them to come forth in gladness, that the bands 
of Horus may exult, and the abodes of Set may 
fall in fear of thee. Ho ! Osiris who dwellest 
among those of Amenti, I am thy sister Isis ; 
neither god nor goddess hath done what I have 
done for thee. ... Osiris, . . . thou 
art the youth at the horizon of heaven daily, and 
thine old age is the beginning of all seasons. 
The Nile cometh at the bidding of thy month, 
giving life to men by the emanations which pio- 
ceed from thy limbs, who by thy coming causest 
all plants to grow up. ... Osiris, thou 
art the lord of millions, raising up all wild ani- 
mals and all cattle ; the creation of all that is 
proceedeth from thee. To thee belongeth all 
that is upon earth; to thee all that is in heaven; 
to thee all that is in the waters; to thee belong- 
eth all that is in life or in death; to thee all 
that is male or female. Thou art the sovereign 
king of the gods, the prince amid the company 
of the gods."* 

Several works are founded upon the Book of 
the Dead, of which they may be considered 
abridgments. The obscurities being avoided, 
these lesser works are more easily understood. 



Renouf, The Religion of Ancient Egypt, pp. 214, 215. 



LANG UA GE AND LITERA TUBE. 229 

Prominent among these is the Book of the 
Breaths of Life, " made by Isis for her brother 
Osiris, for giving new life to his soul and body 
and renewing all his limbs, that he may reach 
the horizon with his father the sun, that his soul 
may rise to heaven in the disk of the moon, that 
his body may shine iii the stars of the constella- 
tion Orion, on the bosom of Nut." 

A beautiful hymn to the sun, with much of 
the true devotional spirit, is contained in the 
Anastasi Papyri of the British Museum, and be- 
longs to the nineteenth dynasty. 

" Come to me, O thou Sun ; 

HoRUS of the horizon, give me (help) ; 

Thou art he that giveth (help) ; 

There is no help without thee, 

Excepting thou (givest it). 

Come to me, Tum, hear me thou great God. 

My heart goeth forth towards An. 

Let my desires be fulfilled, 

Let my heart be joyful, my inmost heart in gladness. 

Hear my vows, my humble supplications every day. 

My adorations by night ; 

My (cries of) terror, . . . prevailing in my mouth, 

Which come from my (mouth) one by one. 

HoRUS of the horizon, there is no other besides like him ; 
Protector of millions, deliverer of hundreds of thousands, 
The defender of him that calls on him, the Lord of An, 
Reproach me not with my many sins. 

1 am a youth, weak in body ; 
I am a man without heart; 



230 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Anxiety comes upon me as an ox upon grass. 

If I pass the night, . . . and I find refreshment, 

Anxiety returns to me in the time of lying down."* 

If such works as the Book of the Dead teach 
us the theology and mythology of the Egyptians, 
the hymns instruct us in their worship. The 
hymn to fhe Nile, found in two papyri of the 
British Museum, is the composition of the well- 
known poet Enna, who was the contemporary 
of Moses : 

"Hail to thee, O Nile! 
Thou shgwest thyself in this laud. 
Coming iu peace, giving life to Egypt. 
O Amnion, (thou) leadest night unto day, 
A leading that rejoices the heart ; 
Overflowing the gardens created by Ra, 
Giving life to all animals ; 
Watering the land without ceasing : 
The way of heaven descending: 
Lover of food, bestower of corn, 
Giving light to every home, PtahI 

Lord of fishes, when the inundation returns, 

No fowls fall on the cultures. 

Maker of spelt ; creator of wheat ; 

Who maintaineth the temples ; 

Idle hands he loathes 

For myriads, for all the wretched. 

If the gods iu heaven are grieved. 

Then sorrow cometh on men. 



Goodwin, Records of the Past, Vol. VI, pp. 100. 101. 



LANOVAQE AND LITERATURE. 231 

He luaketh the whole laud opeu to the oxen, 

And the great and the small are rejoicing ; 

The response of men at his coming ! 

His likeness is NuM ! 

He shineth, then the land exulteth ! 

All bellies are in joy ! 

Every creature receives nourishment ! 

All teeth get food. 

Bringer of food ! Great lord of provisions ! 

Creator of all good things ! 

Lord of terrors and of choicest joys I 

All are combined in him. 

He produceth grass for the oxen ; 

Providing victims for every god. 

The choice incense is that which he supplies. 

Lord in both regions, 

He filleth the granaries, enricheth the storehouses. 

He careth for the state of the poor. 

He causes growth to fulfill all desires, 

He never wearies of it. 

He maketh his might a buckler. 

He is not graven in marble, 

As an image bearing the double crown. 

He is not beheld ; 

He hath neither miuistrauts nor offerings ; 

He is not adored in sanctuaries ; 

His abode is not known ; 

No shrine is found with painted figures. 

There is no building that can contain him! 
There is no counselor in thy heart I 
The youth delight in thee, thy children : 
Tliou directest them as king. 
Thy law is established in the whole land, 



232 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

lu the presence of thy servants in the North : 

Every eye is satisfied with him : 

He eareth for the abundance of liis blessings. 

Tiie inundation conies, (then) conieth rejoicing; 

Every heart exulteth : 

The tooth of the crocodiles, the children of Xeith, 

(Even) the circle of the gods who are counted with thee. 

Doth not its outburst water the fields. 

Overcoming mortals (with joy), 

Watering one to produce another? 

There is none that worketh with him ; 

He produces food without the aid of Neith. 

Mortals he causes to rejoice. 

He giveth light on his coming from darkuess: 

In the pastures of his cattle 

His might produceth all : 

What was not, his moisture bringeth to life. 

Men are clothed to fill his gardens : 

He eareth for his laborers. 

He raaketh even and noontide. 

He is the infinite Ptah and Kabes. 

He createth all works therein, 

All writings, all sacred words. 

All his implements in the North. 

He enters with words the interior of his house; 

When he willeth he goeth forth from his mystic fane. 

Thy wrath is destruction of fishes. 

Then men implore thee for the waters of the season. 

' That the Thebaid may be seen like the Delta. 

That every man be seen bearing his tools, 

No man left behind his comrade ! 

Let the clothed be unclothed, 

No adornments for the sons of nobles, 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 233 

No circle of gods iu the night !' 

The response (of the god) is refreshing water, 

Filling all men with fatness. 

Establisher of justice ! men rejoice 

With flatteriug words to worship thee, 

Worshiped together with the mighty water ! 

Men present offerings of corn, 

Adoring all the gods ; 

No fowls fall on the land. 

Thy hand is adorned with gold, 

As melded of an ingot of gold, 

Precious as pure lapis lazuli. 

Corn in its state of germination is not eaten. 

The hymn is addressed to thee with the harp; 
It is played with a (skillful) hand to theel 
The youths rejoice at thee 1 
Thy own children, 
Thou hast rewarded their labor. 
There is a great one adorning the land ; 
An enlightener, a buckler in front of men, 
Quickening the heart in depression ; 
Loving the increase of all his cattle. 

Thou shinest in the city of the king ; 

Then the householders are satiated with good things, 

The poor man laughs at the lotus. 

All things are perfectly ordered. 

Every kind of herb for thy children. 

If food should fail, 

All enjoyment is cast on the ground. 



The land falls in weariness. 



O inundation of Nile ! offerings are made to thee 
Oxen are slain to thee ; 
20 



234 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Great festivals are kept for thee ; 

Fowls are sacrificed to thee ; 

Beasts of the field are caught for thee ; 

Pure flames are offered to thee ; 

Offerings are made to every god, 

As they are made unto Nile. 

Inceuse ascends unto heaven, 

Oxen, bulls, fowls are burnt! 

Nile makes for himself chasms in the Thebaid ; 

Unknown is his name in heaven. 

He doth not manifest his forms ! 

Vain are all representations ! 

Mortals extol (him), and the cycle of gods! 

Awe is felt by the terrible ones ; 

His son is made lord of all. 

To enlighten all Egypt. 

Shine forth, shine forth, O Nile! shine forth! 

Giving life to men by his oxen ; 

Giving life to his oxen by the pastures! 

Shine forth in glory, Nile!"* 

The following dirge may be in memory of 
Mineptah, the Pharaoh of the Exodus : ^ 

"Amen gave thy heart pleasure. 
He gave thee a good old age, 
A life-time of pleasure followed thee. 
Blessed was thy lip, sound thy arm. 
Strong thy eye to see afar. 
Thou hast been clothed in linen. 
Thou hast guided thy horse and chariot 
Of gold with thy hand ; 



*Cook, Records of the Past, Vol. IV, pp. 105-114. 



LA NG VAGE AND LITERA T VRE. 235 

The whip iu thy hand ; yoked were the steeds ; 

The Xaru aud Xahsi marched before thee, 

A proof of what thou hast done. 

Thou hast proceeded to thy boat of as wood, 

A boat made of it before and behind. 

Thou hast approached the beautiful tower, which 

Thou thyself madest. 

Thy mouth was full of wine, beer, bread, aud flesh; 

Were slaughtered cattle and wine opened ; 

The sweet song was made before thee ; 

Thy head-anointer anointed thee with kami ; 

The chief of thy garden-pools brought crown ; 

The superintendent of thy fields brought birds; 

Thy fisherman brought fish ; 

Thy galley came from Xaru, laden with good things ; 

Thy table was full of horses; 

Thy female slaves were strong ; 

Thy enemies were placed fallen ; 

Thy word no one opposed ; 

Thou hast gone before the gods, the victor, the justified!"* 

Connected with the Egyptian tomb was ;i sepul- 
chral chamber, where the friends of the deceased 
met to sacrifice to his ka. The mummy was 
brought forth and placed near an altar, on which 
were arranged cakes, wine, fruits, vegetables, 
vases of oil, meats^ and other delicacies. The 
relatives affectionately embraced the mummy, or 
tore their hair in grief. After these expressions 
of reverence and sorrow, they adored the mummy, 
or ka, of the deceased with presents of flowers, 



* Birch, Records of the Past, Vol. IV, pp. 49-52. 



236 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

returned it to the tomb, and sadly bent their 
steps homeward. 

The Song of the Harper, dating from th( 
eighteenth dynasty, is a funeral dirge to be sung 
at the feast held on the anniversary of his death 
by the relatives of the deceased. " The song is 
very remarkable for the form of old Egyptian 
poetry, which, like that of the Hebrew, delights 
in a sublimer language, in parallelisms and an- 
titheses, and in the ornament of a burden. No 
doubt it was sung, and it seems to be even 
rhythmic, forming verses of equal length." We 
present three of the verses : 

"The great one is truly at rest, 

The good charge is fulfilled. 

Men pass away since the time of Ra, 

And the youths come in their stead. 

Like as Ra reappears every morning, 

And TuM sets in the horizon, 

Men are begetting, 

And women are conceiving. 

Every nostril inhaleth once the breezes of dawn. 

But all born of women go down to their places. 

Make a good day, O holy father ! 

Let odors and oils stand before thy nostril. 

Wreaths of lotus are on the arms and bosom of thy sister, 

Dwelling in thy heart, sitting beside thee. 

Let song and music be before thy face, 

And leave behind thee all evil cares I 

Mind thee of joy till cometh the day of pilgrimage. 

When we draw near the land which loveth silence. 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 237 

Miud thee of the day, when thou, too, shalt start for the land, 

To which one goeth to return not thence. 

Good for thee then will have been (an honest life) ; 

Therefore be just and hate transgressions, 

For he who loveth justice (will be blessed). 

The coward and the bold neither can fly (the grave). 

The friendless and the proud are alike ; . . . 

Then let thy bounty give abundantly, as is fit ; 

(Love) truth, and Isis shall bless the good, 

(And thou shalt attain a happy) old age."* 

We present, for the sake of comparison, ex- 
tracts from the festal dirge of King Antuf, of 
the eleventh dynast}^ : 

"After all, what is prosperity? 
Their fenced walls are dilapidated. 
Their houses are as that which has never existed. 

No man comes from thence 

AVho tells of their sayings, 

Who tells of their affairs, 

Who encourages our hearts. 
Ye go 
To the places whence they return not. 
Strengthen thy heart to forget how thou hast enjoyed thyself, 
Fulfill thy desire whilst thou livest. 

Put oils upon thy head. 
Clothe thyself with fine linen adorned with precious metals. 

With the gifts of God 

Multiply thy good things, 

Yield to thy desire. 
Fulfill thy desire with thy good things 

(Whilst thou art) upon earth, 
According to the delectation of thy heart. 

The day will come to thee. 

When one hears not the voice. 



■ Stem, Records of the Past, Vol. VI, pp. 129, 130. 



238 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

When the one who is at rest hears not 
Their voices. 
Lamentations deliver not him who is in the tomb. 

Feast in tranquillity, 
Seeing there is no one who carries away his goods with 

him. 
Yea, behold, none who goes thither comes back again."* 

Herodotus may refer to such festal hymns 
when he says : '' In social meetings, among the 
rich, when the banquet is ended, a servant car- 
ries round to the several guests a coffin, in which 
there is a wooden image of a corpse, carved and 
painted to resemble nature as nearly as possible, 
about a cubit or two cubits in length. As he 
shows it to each guest in turn, the servant says : 
' Gaze here, and drink and be merry ; for when 
you die, such will you be.'" f 

There are many magical texts which contain 
not a little theology and mythology. These are 
full of interest, but we can not present any but 
the briefest extracts : 

" When HoRus weeps, the water that ftills 
from his eyes grows into plants, producing a 
sweet perfume. When Baba lets fall blood from 
his nose, it grows into plants changing to cedars, 
that produce turpentine instead of water. When 
Shu and Tefnut weep much, and water falls 

♦Goodwin, Records of the Past, Vol. IV, pp. 117, 118. 
t Herodotus, II, 78. 



LAXGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 239 

from their eyes, it changes into plants that pro- 
duce incense. When the Sun weeps a second 
time, and lets fall water from his eyes, it is 
changed into working bees ; they work in the 
flowers of each kind, and honey and wax are 
produced instead of the water."* 

In the Book of Hades the Egyptians are said 
to be the tears of the eye of Horus, and eatable 
plants are said to come from the divine mouth. 
There is also this remarkabl'e expression : " Their 
food is to hear the word of this god," Ra.f 

The justly celebrated Book of the Dead is as 
much a vast collection of more or less closely 
connected magical texts as anything else. The 
Tale of the Two Brothers, curiously suggest. 
ive of an incident in the life of Joseph — 
Genesis xxxix, 7-21 — is full of mythology and 
magic. Many other writings are not less fruit- 
ful in mysterious and black arts. 

The proverbs and precepts with which we 
frequently meet are full of wisdom. We select 
a decalogue of precepts from a collection of the 
thirty-second dynasty : 

"Make it not in a heart of a mother to enter into 

bitterness." 
"Make not a companion of a wicked man." 



* Birch, Kecords of the Past, Vol. VI, p. 115. 
t Lefebure, Eecords of the Past, Vol. X, p. 109. 



240 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

"Do not do after the advice of a fool." 

"May it not happen to thee to maltreat an inferior, and 

may it happen to thee to respect the venerable 1" 
" Do not save thy life at the cost of that of another." 
' ' Do not go out with a foolish man ; 
Do not stop to listen to his words." 
"Do not pervert the heart of thy acquaintance if he is 

pure." 
"Do not take a haughty attitude." 

"Do not mock the venerable man who is thy superior." 
"Do not amuse thyself or play upon those who are 

dependent upon you."* 

There is much of the supernatural and im- 
possible in the romances of old Egypt. Animals 
and trees speak, the dead come to life, and 
mummies converse in their tombs, or leave their 
coffins, and, after enjoying the society of the 
living for a time, return to their narrow abodes. 
How much of this points to peculiarities of 
belief, and how much may be explained by 
literary license, we are not able to decide. 

There is quite a large mass of epistolary 
correspondence which is worthy of some praise. 
Science is in its infancy, and medicine and math- 
ematics are mediocre. The historical writings 
are of great value. The several volumes of the 
"Egypt Exploration Fund" which have already 
appeared are important contributions to our 
knowledge of the empire of the Nile. 

*Deveria, Records of the Past, Vol. VIII, pp. 159, 160. 



II. 

TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 

A LITTLE east of the Nile, and not far from 
the spot where Memphis was afterward 
built, stood a city of great renown, called Pa-ra, 
or " the City of the Sun " — literally translated by 
the Greeks as HeUopoUs, but known both among 
Egyptians and Hebrews as An or On, a word 
which seems to signify "pillar," or "stone," and 
possibly given on account of some obelisk, or, 
more likely, some sacred stone hidden in the 
innermost sanctuary. The wife of Joseph — Asnet 
or Asnath, "Isis-Neith" — belonged to this city.* 
Here was the most learned priesthood of all 
Egypt, and On was the very center of letters and 
culture. Here the king was crowned, as also at 
Memphis, and received a special title, "sovereign 
lord of On." The religious cult was ancient and 
venerable and prevailed at a later period through- 
out all Egypt. 

R-a, the god of the sun by day, was the chief 
deity of this sacred city. Attributes are ascribed 
to this divinity which can belong only to the 
supreme god — " the lord of truth, the maker of 

* Gen. xli, 45. 

2X 241 



242 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



men, the creator of beasts, the lord of existence, 
the maker of fruitful trees and herbs, the maker 
everlasting, the lord of eternity, the lord of 
wisdom, the lord of mercy, the one maker of 
existences, the one along of many hands, and the 
sovereij^n of life and health and strength." 




OBELISK AND PLAIN OF ON (HELIOPOLIS). 

The god says, in the seventeenth chapter of 
the Book of the Dead : "I am Tun), a being that 
is alone." Tum is the concealed god, who, before 
the creation, existed alone. At On this con- 
cealed god had a temple of wondrous magnifi- 
cence. It was resplendent with gold and all 
precious stones, rich in gifts of mightiest mon- 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 243 

archs, and attended by more than ten thousand 
sacred slaves. Ra exists of himself, and comes 
to view out of this concealment and darkness. 
He is symbolically represented by the scarab?eus, 
or beetle, the emblem of change and transfor- 
mation. Another emblem is ''Ra in the egg" — 
the world-egg which is familiar in many my- 
thologies. Ra traverses the heavens undisturbed, 
and finishes his course ; but in the west, the land 
of Amenti, the kingdom of the dead, in which is 
the abode of the great deity whose name is 
known only to himself — perhaps 
this deity is but the spirit of 
Ra — he must battle with the 
dark powers. 

"The sun-god, after his set- signkt einp, with 

SCARAIi.IiUS. 

ting, has now become a soul; 
and as, in his glory in the heavens, in his gUt- 
tering body, he was represented as a sparrow- 
hawk, so in his concealment as a soul in the 
realm of the dead he is represented by the 
Bennu-bird, the heron, which, as a bird of pas- 
sage, is a symbol of immortality and of return 
to life." 

As the self-begetting god, who constantly 
renews himself, Ra is identified with Chem, who 
was worshiped at Chemmis, or Panopolis, and at 
Thebes, and to some extent throughout Egypt. 




244 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Chem was so inexcusably vile, indecent, and cor- 
rupting in his grossness as to render his repre- 
sentation or description impossible. He symbol- 
ized the male generative power of nature, and in 
the inscription of Darius is called: "The god 
Khem, raising his tall plumes ; king of the gods, 
lifting the hand ; lord of the crown, powerful by 
it; all fear emanates from the fear of him; the 
Kamutf, who resides in the fields, horned in 
all his beauty, engendering the depths." As 
supreme god, the ruler of all things made and 
unmade, he bears the strange title "father of 
his own father."* 

Tum is the god of the setting sun, as Har- 
machis is the god of the rising sun, or " Horos 
on the horizon," whose emblem was the sphinx, 
which symbolized the "power of enlightened and 
disciplined reason." 

When Ra triumphs over the powers of dark- 
ness, and comes forth from the conflict strength- 
ened and purified, he is crowned, and exclaims : 
" It is I who have received the double crown 
with delight; it is I on whom the burden has 
been laid of ruling over the gods in the <]ay 
when the world is set in order by the lord of 
the universe." 



* Birch, Records of the Past, Vol. A'lII, p. 142; Rawlinson, 
ilistory of Ancient Egypt, Vol. I, pp. 342-344. 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 245 

We present a few verses from " The Lit- 
any of Ra :" 

Homage to thee, Ka ! Supreme power, the master of 
the hidden spheres who causes the principles to arise, who 
dwells in darkness, who is born as the all-surrounding 
universe. 

Homage to thee, Ka ! Supreme power, the beetle that 
folds his wings, that rests in the empyrean, that is born 
as his own son. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, the soul that 
speaks, that rests upon her high place, that creates the 
hidden intellects which are developed in her. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, the spirit that 
walks, that destroys its enemies, that sends pain to the rebels. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, he who descends 
into the spheres of Ament, his form is that of Tum. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme powder, he whose body 
is so large that it hides his shape, his form is that of Shu. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, he who leads 
Ra into his members, his form is that of Tefnut. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, the two vipers 
that bear their two feathers, their form is that of the im- 
pure one. 

Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, the timid one 
who sheds tears, his form is that of the afflicted. 

Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, he who is more 
courageous than those who surround him, who sends fire 
into the place of destruction, his form is that of the burn- 
ing one. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, he who makes 
the roads in the empyrean, and who opens pathways in 
the sarcophagus, his form is that of the god who makes 
the roads. 



246 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, he who sends 
forth the stars and who makes the niglit light, in the 
sphere of the hidden essences, his form is that of the 
shining one. 

Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, the high spirit 
who hunts his enemies, who sends fire upon the rebels, his 
form is that of Kaba. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, he who sends 
the flames into his furnaces, he who cuts off the head of 
those who are in the infernal regions, his form is that of 
the god of the furnace. 

• Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, the master of 
souls, who is in his obelisk, the chief of the confined gods, 
his form is that of the master of souls. 

Homage to thee, Ra ! Supreme power, the double lu- 
minary, the double obelisk, the great god who raises his 
two eyes, his form is that of the double luminary. 

Homage to thee, Ra! Supreme power, the master of 
the light, who reveals hidden things, the spirit who speaks 
to the gods in their spheres, his form is that of the mas- 
ter of the light. 

The soul of Ra shines in his shape, his body rests 
amid the invocations which are addressed to him ; he en- 
ters into the interior of his white disk, he lights the em- 
pyrean with his rays, he creates it, he makes the souls 
remain in their bodies; they praise him from the height of 
their pedestal. He receives the acclamations of all the 
gods who open the doors, the hidden essences who pre- 
pare the way for Ra's soul, and who allow the king of 
souls access to the fields.* 

Chepni, the beetle-god, was one of the forms 
of Ra. He is a god both beneficent and dreaded; 



*Naville, Records of the Past, Vol. VIII, pp. 105-117. 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 24? 

for he is the righteous god, and is connected 
with Ma, the goddess of righteousness. 

The myths of Ra are closely related with 
those of Osiris, and the two worships stand side 
by side in harmonious concord. 

We quote part of a hymn from the fifteenth 
chapter of the Book of the Dead : 

Hail, thou who art come as Turn, and who hast been 
the creator of the gods ! 

Hail, thou who art come as soul of the holy souls in 
Ameuti ! 

Hail, supreme among the gods, who by thy beauties 
dost illumine the kingdom of the dead ! 

Hail, thou who comest in radiance and travelest iu 
thy disk ! 

Hail, greatest of all the gods, bearing rule in the high- 
est, reigning in the nethermost heaven ! 

Hail, thou who dost penetrate within the nethermost 
heaven, and hast command of all the gates! 

Hail, among the gods, weigher of words in the king- 
dom of the dead ! 

Hail ! thou art in thine abode creator of the nether- 
most heaven by thy virtue ! 

Hail, renowned and glorified god ! Thy enemies fall 
upon their scaffold ! 

Hail ! thou hast slain the guilty, thou hast destroyed 
Apap (the serpent of darkness) ! * 

Shu and Tefnut are the two lion-gods who 
light Turn as he comes out from his place in the 



* Tiele^ Egyptian Religion, pp. 83, 84. 



248 FIRE FROM S TRA NGE ALTA RS. 

heavenly ocean. Shu is addressed: "Thou who 
hast not thy second among the gods, who brings 
forth the wind by the fire of his mouth, and who 
lights up the two worlds by his brightness." 
There is a representation of the dogs, which 
symbolize the winds, swiftly following Shu. He 
was originally the symbol of cosmic heat and 
light, and is the world-egg in which Ra is to be 
found. " He is the lord who came forth alone 
from the heavenly sea, Nun, over which, in the 
beginning, the quickening breath of the deity 
passed. As the principle of creation, he is un- 
created ; with the beginning of his existence the 
sun began to exist. He is the life-giver, and, 
like all the gods that are to be taken as repre- 
senting the first cause, has the marvelous des- 
ignation bestowed on him of young-old, an 
expression by which the Egyptians sought to 
indicate eternal youth." As the god of the at- 
mosphere, he is depicted as supporting upon his 
uplifted arms the vault of heaven, which is in 
the form of a woman bending forward and stand- 
ing on hands and feet. Rn, the sun-god, is rep- 
resented as traveling along the back of the god- 
dess of heaven.* 

When Shu became identified with the sun, it 
was ns the dread scorchiuii; sun, and he was 



1 



*Tiele, Egyptian lieligion, pp. 84-86. 



TWO GREAT CIBCLES OF GODS. 



249 



closely related with Set. His form was that of 
a male cat. 

Tefnut, his wife, also depicted in Egyptian 
art as a lioness or as a cat, was the great cosmic 
ocean, or the foam of the primordial cosmic 
waters. When Shu was the raging sun, his 
spouse was symbolized by the puffed-up adder of 
deadly sting. Sometimes she is pictured as a 
lioness vomitingflames. 

These are the prin- 
cipal gods of the circle 
of Ra, and of the 
sacred city of On. The 
myth of Ra and his 
conflict with Apap, the 
demon of darkness, 
ever renewed and ever osiris 

scoring a victory for the god of light, while it 
represents the physical struggle, also points to the 
moral warfare waged between good and evil, the 
triumph of the good, and the hope of immortality 
by the resurrection of the dead. 

The seat of another religion, perhaps quite as 
ancient as that of Ra, is Thinis, which was sit- 
uated on the west bank of the Nile, about one 
degree south of Memphis. When Abydos, a 
neighboring city, rose to prominence, Thinis wms 
neglected, and gave way to its more powerful 




250 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

rival. In this old city was a most venerable 
sanctuary, in which Osiris was worshiped as 
lord of the kingdom of the dead. Other tem- 
ples, erected elsewhere to his honor, are doubt- 
less later. 

Plutarch gives the Greek version of the myth 
of Osiris. According to this classic author, Osi- 
ris was an Egyptian king, who, having reformed 
the customs of his own land, with true mission- 
ary zeal traveled abroad, that he might extend 
the blessings of civilization. During his absence, 
the queen, who is at the same time his wife and 
sister, acts as regent, and is faithful to her 
charge. Now Typhon, who is his own brother, 
but is vexed at the mild and beneficent govern- 
ment, forms a conspiracy with an Ethiopian 
queen and certain nobles, which has for its ob- 
ject the death of the king. He causes a sar- 
cophagus to be made which will just fit the body 
of Osiris, whom he invites to a banquet. When 
the guests are assembled, their attention is at- 
tracted to the sarcophagus, and Typhon, as in a 
jest, promises to give it to him whose body it 
will fit. One after the other lie down in the 
chest ; but it is either too short or too long, too 
narrow or too wide, too shallow or too deep, till 
it comes to the turn of the king. His body fits 
the coffin ; but before he can rise, the lid is put 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 251 

on and n<ailed closely down. The sarcophagus 
is thrown into the Nile and floats oiit to sea, but 
comes ashore at By bios, in Phoenicia, where it 
becomes entangled in the top of a tamarind-tree, 
which so embraces it in its growth that it is 
most effectually concealed. The king of Byblos 
cuts the tree down, and places it as a pillar in 
his house. Isis, tlie wife of the uiurdered king, 
and Nephthis, her sister, wail his loss, and seek 
him throughout many lands. At last his faith- 
ful spouse finds him inclosed in the pillar, and 
returns with her treasure to Egypt. But while 
she is on a visit to her son Horos, at Bubastis, 
Typhon finds the body, cuts it in fourteen pieces, 
and scatters them over the country. Isis dis- 
covers the members, and causes each to be buried 
where it is found. Horos avenges his father, 
and slays his murderer, and henceforth Osiris is 
king of the world of the dead. 

With several modern additions, yet this ac- 
count retains much that is ancient and genuine. 
We have the very words of the lamentations of 
the two sisters. Isis mourns: "His sister Isis 
has been filled with concern about him, and has 
scattered his enemies in a threefold rout. . . . 
She is Isis, the illustrious, the avenger of her 
brother; she has sought him without resting; 
she has wandered all round the world as a 



252 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTAKS. 



mourner; she did not cease until she had found 
him. She has made light with her feathers, she 
has made wind with her wings, she has made 
the invocations of the burial of her brother; she 
has taken with her the principles of the god 
with the peaceable heart, she has made an ex- 
tract of his being, she has made (thereof) a 
child, she has suckled the infant in secret. No 

man knows where 
that was done." 
Nephthis la- 
ments: "Ah! 
lordly king, come 
back ! Let thy 
heart rejoice, for 
all they who per- 
secuted thee are 
here no more. 
Thy sisters stand 
beside thy bier; 
they bew^ail thee, 
and shed tears. People turn (?) thee round on 
thy bier, that thou mayest behold their beauty. 
0, speak to us, king and our lord !" 

The Typhon of the Greek myth can be none 
other than Set, with whom Osiris contends. 
His conflicts with this dark god, and his many 
other exploits, must be explained as the ever- 




Isis AND Nephthis. 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 253 

recurring battle between light and darkness, 
order and disorder, good and evil, virtue and 
vice. 

His soul is united with his body in the in- 
visible world, but in the night is displayed in 
the brilliant constellation of Orion, just as the 
soul of his spouse shines forth from Sirius. 

Osiris sometimes appears as a Nile-god, and 
also as a god of wine, and a god of the moon. 
But the Nile, of which he is a god, is rather 
that heavenly stream which refreshes the whole 
earth ; and the wine corresponds to the heavenly 
beverage of immortnlity, of which the moon was 
thought to be the fountain-head. He became, 
in later development, the lord of the universe 
and the lord of all life. 

How these conceptions arose out of the orig- 
inal natural one, is self-evident, and it is equally 
clear how he soon became the type of the good 
man, of the human soul which is obliged to carry 
on a conflict similar to his against the powers 
of death, and which finds in his victory a guar- 
antee of its own triumph, and his rising again a 
pledge of its own immortality. From the most 
ancient times, accordingly, we find the dead, 
both men and women, represented as identifying 
themselves with him, their everlasting ideal." * 

* Tiele, Egj^ptian Religion, p. 45. 



254 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

The pious dead, when through conflicts many 
;tnd fearful they reached the happy fields of the 
Egyptian heaven, feasted at lordly banquets, 
gathered fabulous harvests, bathed in the glo- 
rious light of their god, and sailed with Osiris 
in his bark over the heavenl}^ ocean, or sparkled 
as stars in the night firmament. The wicked 
were consigned to one of the seventy-five com- 
partments of hell, and endured punishments ac- 
cording to their sins. An everlasting death, or 
everlasting darkness, a punishment personified 
by the demon Auai, which is strongly suggestive 
of '^ weeping and gnashing of teeth," was the 
Egyptian conception of that world of horror. 

Osiris was the god of the beneficent sun, and 
was called " the manifester of good, full of good- 
ness and truth; the beneficent spirit, beneficent 
in will and words, mild of heart, and fair and be- 
loved of all who see him." He ''affords plenti- 
fulness, and gives it to all the earth; all men 
are in ecstasy on account of him ; hearts are in 
sweetness, bosoms in joy ; everybody is in 
adorations; every one glorifies his goodness; . . . 
sanctifying, beneficent is his name."* 

The worship of Osiris extended and became 
universal. When his cult was established in 
any place, he took the foi-m of the deity of that 

*Eawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, Vol. I, p. 366. 



TWO OREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 255 

place, and its sacred animal was consecrated to 
him. Honce his many forms and many names. 
In the one hundred and forty-seventh chapter of 
the Book of the Dead there is mention of no less 
than a hundred of these names. Isis, with a 
thousand names, shared his popularity. She 
had temples of her own even under the earliest 
dynasties, and in later times her honors were 
multiplied. She was " the great divine mother," 
the goddess of fecundity. With her husband, 
she ruled over the world of (he dead. 

Set was also a sun-god, who had temples and 
Avas worshiped in early times. He was the god 
of the baneful influences of the sun, and was rev- 
erenced out of fear more than from any other 
motive. He was hated, persecuted, and at last 
so detested that his very name was, wherever 
possible, erased from the monuments. He was 
the es[iecial god who received the homnge of for- 
eign peoples. One of the Shepherd Kings ac- 
corded to him exclusive worship. He was the 
local god of Ombos, and is called the god of the 
Negroes. In remote antiquity Set seems to 
have been honored equally with Horos, the sun- 
god, and, like the latter, stands on the bark of 
the sun and wards off the serpent of darkness. 
But he lost his position in the affections of the 
people, and became the fierce god of fire, war, 



256 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

and death. He was the cause of all evil — earth- 
quakes, lightnings, tempests, pestilences, and, 
finally, moral evil of every kind. The animals 
sacred to him were most unclean — the swine, the 
hippopotamus, the crocodile, and " the monster 
with stiff ears, peculiar snout, and tail erect, 
which is the hieroglyph of this god." He fought 
against Horos, and ag<-iinst Osiris, but was hu- 
miliated and conquered by these bright and be- 
neficent powers. 

Nephthis was the wife of Set, and greatly 
resembled her sister Isis in character. She also 
was called the mother goddess and the mistress of 
heaven. She bewailed the murdered Osiris, and 
is the guardian of the pious dead. She becomes 
by Osiris the mother of Anubis, whom Isis 
adopts and brings up, while, on the other hand, 
Isis is sometimes designated as the wife of Set. 

Horos, unlike his rival companion, became 
most celebrated. He bears such titles as lord of 
truth, lord of heaven, helper of his father, lord 
of the sacred bark, and king of men, and is also 
called "the supreme ruler of gods nnd men." It 
has been thought that Horos, like the Phoenician 
Baal, designates a class of gods rather than a 
single god. As the ancient Horos, he is "hus- 
band of his mother;" as the rising sun, he is 
" the infant Horos ;" and as the son of Isis, he 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 257 

is the avenger of his fjither. He is the warrior- 
god, he stands on the bark of the sun and fights 
against the serpent Apap or the dark god Set. 
He is armed with a spear, a trident, or a sword; 
he hurls his trident at the snout of the hippo- 
potamus-god ; he beheads the wicked in the 
kingdom of the dead. His protecting hawk 
hovers over the heads of Egyptian warriors as 
they march forth to the battle-field. He is also 
lord of the harvest and celebrated for his beauty. 
The sphinx, his well-known symbol, is the em- 
blem of intelligence and strength. 

Hathor, the mother and nurse, and at the 
same time the wife of Horos, was sometimes 
confounded with Isis, whom she closely resem- 
bles. Both were represented with the head of 
a cow, and both wore the same emblems upon 
their coif. Like Nu, she pours the waters of 
life from the heavenly sycamore in which she 
sits, for the refreshment of all those who truly 
thirst. It may have been the result of Greek 
influence that she became the goddess of beauty 
and love, of joy and song. She was called 
"mother of Ra, eye of Ra, mistress of Anienti, 
celestial mother, and lady of the dance and 
mirth." She was the golden goddess also, who 
was the first to greet the rising and the set- 
ting sun. 



258 FIRE FROM STRANGE A L TA RS. 

Thoth was a moon-god, and the king of eter- 
nity. He was the lord of truth and of divine 
words, of knowledge and of priestly culture, of 
arts and sciences, of discoveries and inventions. 
He invented writing, and was the author of the 
most sacred scriptures. He founded libraries 
and made laws, and was the advocate and justi- 
fier of the good at the bar of Osiris. He re- 
vealed the will of the gods. It is said that he 
wrote a work which contained all wisdom, and 
by the use of which all things could be charmed. 
He inclosed this precious volume in a box of 
gold, this in a box of silver, this in a box of 
ivory and ebony, this in a box of bronze, this in 
a box of brass, and the box of brass in a box of 
iron; and, secured in this manner, he threw the 
treasure into the Nile at Coptos, and stationed 
fearful watchers about the place of its conceal- 
ment. It was long sought and at last found, 
but brought to its possessor many misfortunes 
together with its blessings. Thoth was highly 
honored in Egypt, and, as Hermes Trismegistus, 
exerted an influence on the theosophy of the 
early Christian centuries."^ 

Anubis, to be easily recognized by his jackal's 



*See the Theological and Philosophical Works of Hermes 
Trismegistus, Christian Neoplatonist, translated by John David 
Chambers. 



TWO GREAT CIRCLES OF GODS. 259 

head, was the god of embalming and of mum- 
mies, and the conductor of the souls of the de- 
parted. His genealogy, like that of so many 
divinities, is variousl}' given — the son of Osiris 
and Isis, the son of Osiris and Nephthis, the son 
of Set and Nephthis. 

All the Osirian gods are the descendants of 
Seb and Nu. Seb is the god of the earth, whose 
material substance is eternal, and is called the 
most ancient sovereign. Nu is the goddess of 
the heavenly ocean, who supplies the souls of 
the dead with the beverage of immortality, and, 
with the descending dew, gives all good things 
to man. 

"At night, when even the moon is invisible, 
all that is in the universe, all the gods of the 
luminous heaven, are at rest in peace. The 
heaven rests upon the earth like a goose brood- 
ing over her egg. The earth-god alone continues 
to reign. The mistress of the heavenly ocean 
alone shares his vigil, and reveals herself in the 
clear starlight, continuing all the night through 
to bestow her benefits; all the other gods are 
hidden. Thus must it have been, thought the 
Egyptian, once in the beginning of things. 
Then there existed no others, save the eternal 
god, the god of everlasting substance, and the 
eternal waters that covered and overflowed all 



260 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

things. But, just as each morning from the 
marriage of these two, the gods of the clear 
daylight heaven are born, so it happened before 
the ages; so, before Osiris came into being, or 
Horos,"or any one of the gods, did Seb, the father 
of them all, bear sway."* 



*Tiele, Egyptian Religion, pp. 66, 67. 



\ 



III. 

PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 

TT/'HEN the Thinitic kings made Memphis 
VV their seat, they carried with them the 
worship of the Osirian gods, but adopted Ptah, 
the chief deity of the new locality, who reached 
great prominence. When his worship was neg- 
lected, as seems to have been the case at one 
period, the kings were hated and their monu- 
ments desecrated. The reputation of Ptah ex- 
tended with the growth and power of the Old 
Kingdom of the first dynasties. The Greeks 
compared him with Hephaistos, the god of cos- 
mic fire. His name is interpreted as meaning 
"he who forms." As the inAdsible and hidden 
god, his symbol was a mummy, concealed in its 
sarcophagus. He procreates all things. The 
gods come from his mouth, and men from his 
eye. He was, in early times, the god of order, 
justice, righteousness, and truth, and came to 
give laws to men, and was a lover of good. He 
was closely connected with Ma, the goddess of 
righteousness. It must have been at a much 
later period, when he became confounded with 

261 



262 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

the sun-god, that he could be cnlled "the lord 
of the long times, the honorable, the golden, and 
the beautiful." 

Ptah has but one son mentioned in the Egyp- 
tian literature, Imhotep by name. " He is a per- 
sonification of the sacrificial fire, and of the wor- 
ship regulated by the sacred book, and he is 
always represented with this book upon his 
knees; and the texts designate him as the first 
of the Cherhib, a class of priests who were at 
the same time choristers and physicians; for the 
sacred hymns were believed to have a magical 
power as remedies." 

Together with Ptah, two goddesses, Sechet or 
Bast and Neith, were prominent in the worship 
of Lower Egypt. Neith had her chief seat at 
Sais, and the Libyans were especially devoted 
to her cult. Sechet was a favorite among the 
Arab tribes, and had her chief seat at Bubastis, 
where, under the name of Bast, she was held in 
high honor. We also meet with Chnum, the god of 
the cataracts. There will be further mention of 
these divinities in a succeeding portion of this 
chapter. 

From the sixth to the eleventh dynasty, an 
obscurity rests upon Egyptian history, and we 
are able to gather but little information concern- 
ing the Egyptian religion during this long period. 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 263 

When the light increases and begins to dispel 
the darkness, we find a different set of gods 
holding swny. These are the local gods of the 
Thebaid, brought into distinguished renown by 
the rise of Thebes and the glory of the Middle 
Kingdom. 

Chem, or Min, is the god of Coptos and 
Cheinnis, and his twofold name corresponds to 
his characters as god of divine power and god of 
fertility. "He is the hidden male nature-power, 
the creator represented as fertilizer of the world ; 
hence, at agricultural festivals he had the first 
place. An opening flower, or some similar sym- 
bol, is usually placed beside him." He is but a 
form of the sun-god, and is closely connected 
with Amon, like whom he is called "husband of 
his mother." 

Amon, "the hidden one," as the life-giving 
power of nature, became the highest deity. 
Munt, or Mentu, was the god of war, and may 
be identified with Horos in his exceptional char- 
acter as the war-god and the god of death. Amon 
was also a god of war. These gods are evidently 
very closely related, and are but modifications of 
the same divine conception. The warlike char- 
acter of these gods does not fully appear till the 
period of the New Kingdom. 

During the dynasties of the Middle Kingdom, 



264 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

there were peaceful gods suitable to a prosperous 
agricultural people. 

Chnum, the god of the cataracts, now attains 
extraordinary prominence. He is the architect 
of the universe, and in him the two ideas of 
cosmic fire and divine breath are combined. He 
broods over the cataracts, and these were con- 
sidered the source of all Egyptian waters. Sati, 
his companion, ''the arrow," speaks of the swift- 
ness of the waters as they dash along. The cat- 
aracts are the celestial waters localized. Anuka 
is another companion of this god, and is the 
female principle of fertility. Chnum, in his char- 
acter as the fertilizer, was symbolized by the 
ram. As the creator, he is " the father of fathers, 
the mother of mothers." The chief seat of the 
worship of Chnum and his associate divinities 
was at Elephantine. 

Amenemha III was a devoted worshiper of 
Sebak, the crocodile-headed god, whose cult he 
imported into his new province, the Fayoum. 
The god was, perhaps, a native of Ethiopia, a 
province which had been subdued by Usertasen 
III, the father of Amenemha. His worship had 
been introduced at Ombos, Coptos, and elsewhere, 
and had attained great importance before it was 
tr;insferred to the Fayoum. 

There was a firm belief among the Egyptians 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 265 

that the crocodiles of the Nile always deposited 
their eggs along the line of the limit of its inunda- 
tion. From this the conclusion was drawn that 
the god of the river was a crocodile, or at least 
had the form of a crocodile. Sebak was the god 
of the inundation, and, since the soil of the 
Fayoum was deposited from the sacred stream, 
he was an appropriate god of this new territory. 
When he had a companion distinct from the local 
goddess of the place where his worship was 
established, she was imported from a foreign 
country. Since Set also had the symbol of the 
crocodile, Sebak was confounded with him, and 
suffered with his waning reputation. He was 
also thrown into some obscurity, and that too at 
an ancient period, in comparison with Hapi, the 
god of the Nile, who was profoundly reverenced, 
especially at such places as were touched by the 
stream. 

The Hyksos who destroyed the Middle 
Kingdom made war upon the Egyptian religion, 
but spared Set, or Sutech, as nearest resembling in 
character their own national god, by whatever 
name he may have been called. When the 
Egyptian scribe copied the treaty between 
Rameses II. and the Hittites, it may have been 
from inability to read the divine name that he 
called the god of the Hittites Sutech. Apepi 

23 



266 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

sought to conciliate those whom he had roused 
to desperate measures by his assault upon their 
gods. He proposed to the prince of Thebes to 
recognize Amon-Ra also, in his religious devo- 
tions. The proposition came too late. The 
invaders and oppressors were expelled, and the 
gods of Egypt again received their accustomed 
honors. 

With the expulsion of the Hyksos we reach 
the most brilliant period in Egyptian history. 
The golden age of literature was during the 
eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties. The purest 
and most exalted conceptions of God may be 
assigned to this period. The loftiest religious 
thought and the deepest philosophical speculation 
culminated in the conception of Amon-Ra. If 
he be not a purely spiritual being, he is the 
closest approximation possible to Egyptian 
thought. Amon-Ra combines in himself the 
great gods, and he is addressed in language with 
which we may compare the inspired utterances 
of the psalmists of the Old Testament. 

To Amon as the supreme creator is assigned 
Amont as a companion; to Amon-Ra, as the 
visible god of the sun, belongs Mat or Mut, or 
the Hathor of the Thebaid ; and to Amon, as the 
hidden god of the sun, is given Ape, the goddess 
of the night-heavens. 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 267 

Chonsn is the son of Amon and Mut. He is 
a moon-god, bears on his head the lunar disk, and 
carries in his hand a palm-branch as the symbol 
of time and eternity. "He is certainly the 
revealer of the will of the hidden god of night. 
Very great power was attributed to him ; his 
oracles were consulted ; he himself watched over 
the execution of his commands. One of his 
surnames is Pa-ar-secher, 'he who does what 
pleases him ;' and in the temple of Chonsu-Thot 
this may be read : ' Whatever comes out of his 
mouth comes to pass, and if he speaks, what he 
has ordained happens.' He was resorted to for 
the cure of all diseases, or for the exorcism of 
all the evil spirits who inflict them." * 

The other great gods of Egypt were reformed 
after the model of Amon-Ra ; the gods of lesser 
rank became servants, or mere forms of the 
greater gods. In this manner the principal gods 
were amalgamated. The names and attributes 
of each were assigned to the others. There 
seems to have been the feeling that, under these 
many names and forms, the one unnamed 
and unknown god sought to become manifest. 
Notwithstanding this monotheism, from kingly 
policy, the Egyptians still clung to the old 
forms of worship and primitive cults. Any 

*Tiele, Egyptian xveiigion, p. 154. 



268 FIRE FROM STRANOE ALTARS. 

change which aimed to abandon old sanctuaries, 
abolish revered forms of worship and sacred 
symbols, or erase venerable divine names, would 
have been resented and would have threatened 
the overthrow of the government. Hence there 
was the largest religious toleration. The chief 
gods of all the great geographical divisions of 
the country were not forgotten. Thebes became 
the religious metropolis of Egypt, and Amon-Ra 
became the ruler of the gods. 

The hymns to the great god of Thebes are 
among the most beautiful in Egyptian hym- 
nology. The following is from the nineteenth 
dynasty : 

"Praise to Amen-Ra! 
The Bull in An, chief of all gods, 
The good god beloved, 
Giving life to all animated things, 
To all fair cattle. 

Hail to thee, Araen-Ra, lord of the thrones of the earth. 
Chief of Aptu, 

The Bull of his mother in his field, 
Turning his feet towards the land of the South, 
Lord of the heathen, prince of Punt, 
The ancient of heaven, the oldest of the earth. 
Lord of all Bxistences, the support of things, the support 
of all things! 

The One in his works, single among the gods, 
The beautiful Bull of the cycle of gods, 
Chief of all the gods, 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 269 

Lord of truth, father of the gods, 

Maker of men, creator of beasts. 

Lord of existences, creator of fruitful trees. 

Maker of herbs, feeder of cattle. 

Good being begotten of Ptah, beautiful youth beloved, 

To whom the gods give honor, 

Maker of things below and above, enlightener of the 

earth. 
Sailing in heaven in tranquillity, 
King Ra, true speaker, chief of the earth, 
Most glorious one, lord of terror, 
Chief creator of the whole earth. 

Supporter of affairs above every god, 

In whose goodness the gods rejoice. 

To whom adoration is paid in the great house, 

Crowned in the house of flame. 

Whose fragrance the gods love, 

When he comes from Arabia, 

Prince of the dew, traversing foreign lands, 

Benignly approaching the Holy Land. 

The gods attend his feet, 

Whilst they, acknowledge his majesty as their lord. 

Lord of terror most awful, 

Greatest of spirits, mighty in . . , 

Bring offerings, make sacrifices. 

Salutation to thee, maker of the gods, 

Supporter of the heavens, founder of the earth. 

Awake in strength, Min Amen, 

Lord of eternity, maker everlasting, 

Lord of adoration, chief in . . . 

Strong with beautiful horns. 

Lord of the crown high-plumed. 

Of the fair turban, (wearing) the white crown. 



270 FIRE FROM STRANOE ALTARS. 

The coronet and the diadem are the ornaments of his face. 

He is invested with Ami-lia. 

The double-crown is his liead-gear ; (he wears) the red 

crown. 
Benignly he receives the Atef-crown, 
On Avhose south and on whose north is love. 
The lord of life receives the scepter, 
Lord of the breastplate, armed with the whip. 

Gracious ruler, crowned with the white crown, 

Lord of beams, maker of light, 

To whom the gods give praises, 

Who stretches forth his arms at his pleasure, 

Consuming his enemies with flame ; 

Whose eye subdues the wicked. 

Sending forth its dart to the roof of the firmament. 

Sending its arrows against Naka to consume him. 

Hail to thee, Ra, lord of truth, 

Whose shrine is hidden, lord of the gods, 

Chepra in his boat. 

At whose command the gods were made, 

Athom, maker of men. 

Supporting their works, giving them life. 

Distinguishing the color of one from another, 

Listening to the poor who is in distress. 

Gentle of heart when one cries unto him. 

Deliverer of the timid man from the violent, 
Judging the poor, the poor and the oppressed, 
Lord of wisdom whose precepts are wise. 
At whose pleasure the Nile overflows. 
Lord of mercy, most loving. 
At whose coming men live. 
Opener of every eye. 
Proceeding from the firmament, 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 271 

Causer of pleasure and light, 

At whose goodness the gods rejoice, 

Their hearts revive when they see him. 

O Ra ! adored in Aptu, 

High-crowned in the house of the obelisk, 

Kiug (Ani), lord of the new-moon festival, 

To whom the sixth and seventh days are sacred, 

Sovereign of life, health, and strength ; lord of all the gods 

Who are visible in the midst of heaven, 

Ruler of men . . . 

Whose name is hidden from his creatures, 

In his name, which is Amen. 

Hail to thee, who art in tranquillity, 

Lord of magnanimity, strong in apparel, 

Lord of the crown high-plumed, 

Of the beautiful turban, of the tall white crown, 

The gods love thy presence. 

When the double crown is set upon thy head, 

Thy love pervades the earth. 

Thy beams arise . . . men are cheered by thy rising. 

The beasts shrink from thy beams. 

Thy love is over the southern heaven ; 

Thy heart is not (unmindful of) the northern heaven. 

Thy goodness . . . (all) hearts. 

Love subdues (all) hands. 

Thy creations are fair, overcoming (all) the earth. 

(All) hearts are softened at beholding thee. 

The one maker of existences, 
(Creator) of . . . maker of beings, 
From whose eyes mankind proceeded, 
Of whose mouth are the gods, 
Maker of grass for the cattle, 
Fruitful trees for men. 



272 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Causiug the fish to live in the river, 

The birds to fill the air, 

Giving breath to those in the egg. 

Feeding the bird that flies, 

Giving food to the bird that perches, 

To the creeping thing and the flying thing equally, 

Providing food for the rats in their holes, 

Feeding the flying things in every tree. 

Hail to thee for all these things, 
The one alone with many hands. 
Lying awake while all men lie (asleep), 
To seek out the good for his creatures, 
Amen, sustainer of all things, 
Athom, Horns of the horizon, 
Homage to thee in all their voices, 
Salutation to thee for thy mercy unto us, 
Protestations to thee who hast created us. 

Hail to thee, say all creatures. 

Salutation to thee from every land. 

To the height of heaven, to the breadth of the earth, 

To the depths of the sea. 

The gods adore thy majesty ; 

The spirits thou hast created exalt (thee) ; 

Rejoicing before the feet of their begetter. 

They cry out welcome to thee. 

Father of the fathers of all the gods. 

Who raises the heavens, who fixes the earth. 

Maker of beings, creator of existences, 

Sovereign of life, health, and strength, chief of the gods. 

We worship thy spirit who alone hast made us. 

We whom thou hast made (thank thee) that thou hast given 

us birth ; 
We give to thee praises on account of thy mercy to us. 



I 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 273 

Hail to thee, luaker of all beings, 

Lord of truth, father of the gods, 

^Nlaker of men, creator of Beasts, 

Lord of grains, 

Making food for the beast of the field, 

Amen, the beautiful Bull, 

Beloved in Aptu, 

High-crowned in the house of the obelisk, 

Twice-turbaned in An, 

Judge of combatants in the great hall, 

Chief of the great cycle of the gods. 

The one alone without peer. 

Chief of Aptu, 

King over his cycle of gods, 

Living in truth forever, 

(Lord) of the horizon, Horos of the east, 

He who hath created the soil (with) silver and gold, 

The precious lapis lazuli at his pleasure, 

Spices and incense various for the peoples, 

Fresh odors for thy nostrils. 

Benignly come to the nations, 

Amen-Ra, lord of the thrones of the earth, 

Chief of Aptu, 

The sovereign on his throne. 

King alone, single among the gods, 

Of many names, unknown is their number. 

Rising in the eastern horizon, setting in the western 

horizon, 
Overthrowing his enemies, 
Dawning on (his) children daily and every day, 
Thoth raises his eyes, 
He delights himself with his blessings. 
The gods rejoice in his goodness who exalts those who are 

lowly. 



274 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

Lord of the boat and the barge, 

They conduct thee through the firmament in peace. 

Thy servants rejoice, 

Beholding the overthrow of the wicked. 

His limbs pierced with the sword, 

Fire consumes him, 

His soul and body are annihilated. 

Naka saves his feet; 

The gods rejoice; 

The servants of the sun are in peace ; 

An is joyful ; 

The enemies of Athom are overthrown and Aptu is in 

peace ; An is joyful ; j 

The giver of life is pleased 1 

At the overthrow of the enemies of her lord; ^ 

The gods of Kher-sa make salutations, 
They of the Adytum prostrate themselves. 



They behold the mighty one in his strength, 

The image of the gods of truth, the lord of Aptu, 

In thy name of doer of justice, 

Lord of sacrifices, the Bull of offerings. 

In thy name of Amen, the Bull of his mother. 

Maker of men, 

Causing all things which are to exist, 

In thy name of Athom Chepra, 

The great hawk making (each) body to rejoice, 

Benignly making (each) breast to rejoice, 

Type of creators, high-crowned, 

. . . (lord) of the wing, 

Uati is on his forehead. 

The hearts of men seek him. 

When he appears to mortals. 



I 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 275 

He rejoices the earth with his goiugs forth. 

Hail to thee, Amon-Ra, lord of the thrones of the world, 

Beloved of his city when he shines forth."* 

Thotmes III, who more than any other Egyp- 
tian monarch is worthy of the title of " The Great," 
was the founder of the religious pantheon at 
Thebes, and the author of that policy which 
placed Amon-Ra at the head of all the gods of 
Egypt. 

A still more thororgh religious reformation 
was attempted by Amenophis IV. Indeed, this 
was nothing less than a religious revolution. He 
raised the god Aten, the splendor of the sun's 
disk, to the supreme position in place of 
Amon-Ra. It has been but lately discoA^ered 
that this king was of Asiatic lineage and had 
been educated in the religion of the Semites, and 
naturally desired to bring the Egyptian religion, 
as far as possible, into harmony with the faith 
of his fathers. He adopted no half measures, 
but made his work most thorough and complete. 
He demanded for Aten exclusive worship, while 
he endeavored to root out all other forms of 
worship. The monuments dedicated to other 
gods were destroyed, and the name of Amon was 
erased or chiseled out wherever it occurred, even 
in combination in the names of kings. The 

* Goodwin, Records of the Past, Vol. II, pp. 129-136. 



276 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

names of Ra and Osiris were respected, but this 
was only because tliey, too, were names of 
the one sun-god. He changed his own name to 
Khunaten, "glitter of the sun's disk." He may 
have considered Thebes too polluted for his resi- 
dence ; it may have been a measure of necessity 
to secure his personal safety and that of his 
court — whatever the reason, he removed his 
capital to a new locality, now marked by the 
vast and magnificent ruins of Tell-el-Amarna. 
Here he built the great temple of the sun, where 
his favorite god received the adoration which was 
his due as the one god. The king himself was 
most ugly in person, but seems to have been 
recognized as the type of beauty — at least the 
works of art which belong to his reign are as 
ugly as his own repulsiveness. 

A servant of the king prays : " Beautiful is 
thy setting, thou sun's disk of life, thou lord of 
lords, and king of the worlds. When thou 
unitest thyself with the heaven at thy setting, 
mortals rejoice before thy countenance, and give 
lionor to him who has created them, and pray 
before him who has formed them, before the 
glance of thy son, who loves thee, the king 
Khunaten. The whole land of Egypt and all 
peoples repeat all thy names at thy rising, to mag- 
nify thy rising in like manner as thy setting. 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. TJ1 

Thou, God, who art in truth the living one, 
standest before the two eyes. Thou art he 
which Greatest what never was, which formest 
everything that is in the universe. We also 
have come into being through the word of thy 
mouth. Give me favor before the king every 
day; let there not be wanting to me a good 
burial after attaining old age in the territory of 
Khu-aten, when I shall have finished my course 
of life peaceably." 

His wife addresses the god : " Thou disk of 
the sun, thou living god ! there is none other 
besides thee ! Thou givest health to the eyes 
through thy beams, creator of all beings. Thou 
goest up on the eastern horizon of heaven, to 
dispense life to all which thou hast created ; to 
man, four-footed beasts, birds, and all manner of 
creeping things on the earth, where they live. 
Thus they behold thee, and they go to sleep 
when thou settest. Grant to thy son, who loves 
thee, life in truth, to the lord of the land, 
Khunaten, that he may live united with thee 
in eternity. As for her, his wife, the queen 
Nofer-i-Thi — may she live for evermore and 
eternally by his side, well-pleasing to thee ! She 
admires what thou hast created day by day."* 

After the death of Khunaten, his immediate 



Brugsch, Egypt under the Pharaohs, Vol. I, pp. 501, 502. 



278 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

successors returned to the worship of Amon and 
other gods. Horemheb defaced the monuments 
of the reformer, used the stones in other buildings, 
made pavements thereof, and endeavored to 
destroy every trace of the heresy. During the 
remainder of Egyptian history the fortune of the 
gods fluctuated, corresponding with the varying 
fortune of the cities in which their cult was 
established, with a tendency to give national 
importance to several of the greatest and to 
recognize all. 

Under Seti I, and his son Rameses II, 
there was a revival of Osiris worship in a 
modified form ; and the latter king was fer- 
vently devoted to Set. Indeed the religion of 
Tanis became the prevalent faith of lower 
Egypt ; but after the fall of the Ramesides it was 
overshadowed by the cult of Mendes or the 
worship of the he-goat, perhaps identical with 
that of Chnum in his purified form as the 
spirit of the universe. 

Herodotus gives the following description of 
the temple of Bast at Bubastis : "Excepting the 
entrance, the whole forms an island. Two arti- 
ficial channels from the Nile, one on either side 
of the temple, encompass the building, leaving 
only a narrow passage by which it is approached. 
These channels are each a hundred feet wide, and 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 279 

are thickly shaded with trees. The gateway is 
sixty feet in height, and is ornamented with 
figures cut upon the stone, six cubits high and 
well worthy of notice. The temple stands in 
the middle of the city, and is visible on all sides 
as one walks round it ; for as the city has been 
raised up by embankment, while the temple has 
been left untouched in its original condition, you 
look down upon it wheresoever you are. A low 
wall runs round the inclosure, having figures 
engraved upon it, and inside there is a grove of 
beautiful tall trees growing round the shrine, 
which contains the image of the goddess. The 
inclosure is a furlong in length, and the same in 
breadth. The entrance to it is by a road paved 
with stone for a distance of about three fur- 
longs, which passes straight through the market- 
place with an easterly direction, and is four 
hundred feet in width. Trees of an extraor- 
dinary height grow on each side of the road, 
which conducts from the temple of Bubastis to 
that of Mercury." 

The following is his account of the festival 
celebrated in honor of the goddess : " Men and 
women come sailing all together, vast numbers, in 
each boat, many of the women with castanets, 
which they strike, while some of 'the men pipe 
during the whole time of the voyage ; the 



280 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

remainder of the voyagers, male and female, sing 
the while, and make a clapping with their hands. 
When they arrive opposite any of the towns 
upon the banks of the stream, they approach the 
shore, and, while some of the women continue to 
play and sing, others call aloud to the females of 
the place and load them with abuse, while a 
certain number dance. . . . After proceeding 
in this way all along the river course, they reach 
Bubastis, where they celebrate the feast with 
abundant sacrifices. More grape- wine is con- 
sumed at this festival than in all the rest of the 
year besides."* 

The goddess is called Pacht, "the devouring 
one," or Sechet, "she that kindles the fire," and 
is represented as a lioness vomiting forth flames, 
or as a woman with the head of a cat. The 
tortures of the wicked in the other world are 
under her direction, and the flames which issue 
from her mouth consume her enemies. She 
seems to be the goddess of the scorching heat of 
the sun, but also possesses another and more 
peaceful character. 

The Libyans had always been worshipers of 
Neith, who was also known among the Egyptians 
during the first dynasties. She was the local 
goddess of Sais, and owes her brilliant reputation 

* Herodotus, II, pp. 138, 60. 



PTAH, AMON, AND OTHER DIVINITIES. 281 

to the Saitic kings. Neith is a mother-goddess, 
but differs from other mother-goddesses in being 
a virgin-goddess. We may compare her with the 
highest sun-god who creates himself without a 
father. It is the deepest ground of all being. 
Neith became, in her development, the goddess of 
science and wisdom. Like so many of the 
divinities of Egypt, she had a double nature, and 
was the goddess of war. " She was represented 
either in human shape or in that of a cow lying 
down, and in both forms has a disk of gold 
between her horns, and her head and neck 
adorned with gold, and draped with a mantle of 
purple." 

When Egypt was conquered by the Persians, 
Neith was at the height of her influence, and 
retained her supremacy for many years, and her 
fame spread far beyond the bounds of her native 
land. 

Such are the principal divinities of old Egypt. 
With much that is incongruous in their character 
and worship, we find also much that is highly 
spiritual and truly ennobling. 

24 



IV. 
DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 

EACH deity of the Egyptian pantheon was 
limited in power and local in influence, 
though the chief gods were worshiped over a 
wide territory. The divinities which were recog- 
nized and honored were innumerable. There was 
one for each locality, month, day, and hour ; and 
they were all subject to the same weaknesses 
and infirmities as men. 

But the inferior deities often seem to be mere 
aspects of the greater gods, and many of their 
names are in reality but names of the same gods. 
In one place Ra is invoked under no less than 
seventy-five names. The Book of the Dead has 
a whole chapter devoted to an enumeration of 
the names of Osiris. Indeed, Osiris and Ra, 
both aspects of the sun-god — which in themselves 
fill the character of all Egyptian divinities — are 
sometimes confounded one with the other, and 
in many places there is to be discovered even a 
distinct profession of monotheism. 

The sun, as Osiris or Ra, became the symbol 
of Grod, though at first, perhaps, only the symbol 

2«2 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 283 

of life. It is evident that the Egyptian religion, 
as known to the Greeks and Romans and the 
early Christians, had greatly degenerated from 
its former comparative purity. Notwithstanding 
the fact which we have just stated, we certainly 
find in early times the doctrine of one god and 
the doctrine of a plurality of gods taught side 
by side without a thought, so far as we are able 
to discover, of the slightest inconsistency. The 
word for god, nutar — according to Renouf, to 
whom we are indebted for much of the material 
of this chapter — like the Hebrew El, means 
"power." The Coptic nufi, mite, is used in the 
Coptic version of the Bible, which was made 
probably in the third century. The common 
Egyptian expression nutar nutra corresponds to 
the Hebrew El Shaddai. Nutar was a common 
noun, and was used for any power active in na- 
ture, as well as for the Supreme Power. It will 
be seen, then, that the Egyptians were not incon- 
sistent in teaching monotheism and polytheism 
at the same time. 

In many passages the lingular number may 
be appropriately translated " God." A few ex- 
amples may be presented in illustration : " If 
thou art a wise man, bring up thy son in the 
love of God. God loveth the obedient, and 
hateth the disobedient. Praised be God for all 



284 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

his gifts. Curse not thy master before God. 
Give thyself to God. Keep thyself continually 
for God, and let to-morrow be like to-day. Letj 
thine eyes consider the act of God. It is he 
who smiteth him that is smitten." In these 
passages, and many others of like character, there 
is the true religious spirit. Nutar is The Power. 
But nutriu, or " powers," are also named — es- 
pecially the power connected with the regular 
return of day and night, light and darkness — 
powers which are at first merely physical, then 
personified, then fixed by a name in some myth, 
and at last celebrated in legends which are sup- 
posed to set off or explain the myth. There 
arise- powers as divinities, and stories of their 
relations and exploits. 

A single illustration, as worked out by Renouf, 
whom we have followed in the above, will show 
how closely Egyptian resembles Aryan mythol- 
ogy. When we translate the names of the gods 
in the illustration, the legend to which reference 
is made is explained. 

The parents of Osiris, or the sun, are Seb and 
Nut, or the earth and heaven. Before his birth, 
Osiris wedded his sister Isis, or the dawn. Their 
son is Horus, or the sun in his full strength. 
Set, or darkness, triumphs over Osiris in the 
west. Nephthis, or sunset, is the spouse of Set. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 285 

Osiris mistook Nephthis for her sister Isis, and 
the fruit of their union is a son — Anubis, or the 
twilight. Set is the brother of Osiris and Isis, 
and Nephthis is their sister. It will be seen 
how easily all this can be explained on a ph3^s- 
ical basis, according to the solar hypothesis of 
mythology. 

The gods of the Egyptians, as well as those 
of the Indians, Greeks, and Teutons, were the 
powers of nature, the "strong ones," whose 
might was seen and felt to be irresistible, yet so 
constant, unchanging, and orderly in its opera- 
tion, as to leave no doubt as to the presence of 
an everlasting and active Intelligence. Yet these 
same gods were so subject to human infirmities 
that they could be frightened and set one against 
the other in hostile array. It was believed that 
they governed nature and all things by law, but 
still the Egyptians looked for incessant and dis- 
jointed intervention. There were different phases 
of thought in regard to the gods in different 
periods of history, and sometimes a perplexing 
mingling of apparently contradictory ideas during 
the same period. 

The individual gods were frequently repre- 
sented as not limited in power by any other gods. 
Each of a number of gods was as good as any 
other god, and as good as all other gods. This 



286 FIRE FROM STRAXGE ALTARS. 

phase of religious thought has been called by the 
convenient but somewhat awkward term " Heno- 
theism." It is presented in hymns dating from 
the early part of the eighteenth dynasty. Many 
of the divinities — Osiris, Horos, Ra, Ptah — are 
represented as supreme and absolute. 

The Almighty God says : " I am the maker of 
heaven and earth, I raise its mountains and the 
creatures which are upon it; I make the waters, 
and the Mehura comes into being. ... I 
am the maker of heaven and of the mysteries of 
the twofold horizon. It is I who have given 
to all the gods the soul which is within them. 
When I open my eyes, there is light; when I 
close them, there is darkness. ... I make 
the hours, and the hours come into existence." 
This is "the Almighty God, the self-existent, 
who made heaven and earth, the waters, the 
breath of life, fire, the gods, men, animals, cattle, 
reptiles, birds, fishes, men, and gods." Again, he 
is represented as saying : " I am yesterday, I am 
to-day, I am to-morrow." Other gods are repre- 
sented in equal ample terms. 

The number of the gods does not equal the 
number of names. The god whose words we 
have quoted, says : " I am Chepra in the morn- 
ing, Ra at noon, Tniu in the evening." The Nile 
is a god, but is identified with Ra, Amou, Ptah, 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 287 

and other gods; sometimes Nile seems to be 
identified with the Supreme and Unnamed God — 
the heavenly Nile, which gives life and refresh- 
ment to the whole world. 

Amon, the chief divinity of Thebes, is most 
clearly identified with the Supreme, the Uncre- 
ated Being. He is called "the lord of lords, 
king of the gods, the father of fathers, the pow- 
erful of the powerful, the substance which was 
from the beginning." He is described as " listen- 
ing to the poor who is in distrsss; gentle of 
heart when one cries to him ; deliverer of the 
timid man from the violent; judging the poor, 
the poor and the distressed; lord of wisdom, 
whose precepts are wise, and at whose pleasure 
the Nile overflows; lord of mercy, at whose 
coming men live; opener of every eye, proceed- 
ing from the firmament; causer of pleasure and 
light, at whose goodness the gods rejoice, and 
their hearts revive when they see him." He 
has the attributes of the Supreme God, and 
performs works only possible to the Almighty. 

There is an approach towards monotheism in 
the latest hymns to Amon, yet Egypt stopped 
short of monotheism and rested in pantheism. 
Thus Amon is addressed : " Thou art heaven, 
thou art earth, thou art fire, thou art water, thou 
art air, and whatever is in the midst of them." 



288 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

God is "immanent in all things." "He alone 
maketh himself in millions of ways" — "perma- 
nently abiding in all- things ; the Living One, in 
whom all things are everlasting." 

This pantheism told upon Egyptian morality. 
The ethical system was practically destroyed, 
though the moral instincts of many lifted them 
above the existing theology. If everything be 
an emanation from God, and hence a part of 
God, then sin is impossible. This was a hope- 
less fall, and resulted in those features so dis- 
gusting to Jews, Greeks, and Christians. 

"In contemplating the doctrines of ancient 
Egypt, we are seized with a kind of giddiness, 
like one on the verge of a fathomless abyss. 
No mythology has ever possessed so great a 
store of fantastical and complex myths, engrafted 
on a simple principle like that of monotheism. 
In this system it would appear as if man and 
the shades of the dead were imperceptibly bound 
by one immense chain to innumerable deities 
representing the special modes of being, the 
forms, and the will of the universal being in 
whom the whole centers. As a whole, it con- 
stitutes a special kind of pantheism, to define 
which exactly would require a science more ad- 
vanced than ours."* 



■Chabas. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 289 

The worship of animals had ' its origin in 
a very remote period of Egyptian history. It 
may have been originally a pure animism. " The 
explanation of it lies in the tendency usually 
denominated fetishistic, but more properly ani- 
mistic, which led men to see in animals, distin- 
guished for beauty or strength, or by the services 
which they perform, or by the injury they do, or 
by their form, their color, or by any other spe- 
cialty, the incarnation of powerful spirits, whom 
it is good policy to worship, in order that their 
anger may be averted or their favor gained." * 

This worship did not abide in mere animism, 
but was raised to a higher level. The Egyp- 
tians studied the habits of the animal kingdom 
with great accuracy of observation. Certain 
characteristics of various animals strongly im- 
pressed their minds — not always the same char- 
acteristics which would impress us. As we may 
metaphorically call a man a "lion," in praise of 
his strength — or, again, as the Son of God is 
called "the Lion of the tribe of Judah," so the 
Egyptians called Thotmes III a " crocodile," a 
"jackal," and a "young bull." In like manner 
they called the gods by the names of animals 
which possessed, in an exceptionally high degree, 
characteristics which they conceived as belong- 

*Tiele, Egyptian Religion, p. 102. 
25 



290 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



the bull representin 



ing to such gods. We use the names "lamb* 
"dove," and "lion" in a similar manner. In 
some cases the name of a god means also some 
particuLir kind of animal. Anubis means "jackal," 
and Sebak means "crocodile." This metaphor- 
ical language acted disastrously upon thought, 
and conquered thought. For example, instead of 
god, he himself became 
divine and was worshiped 
as a god. So that which 
at first was intended to 
assist w^orship — by pre- 
senting an appropriate 
symbol of the god to catch 
the eye, excite the imag- 
^"^- ination, and hold the at- 

tention — at last destroyed real w^orship by arrest- 
ing the mind, and thus preventing it from looking 
through the symbol up to God. 

If the Supreme God is to be symbolized by 
any visible form, the living form is certainly best 
adapted to this end. The Egyptians recognized 
this fact, and hence the whole system of animal 
worship. Some animals were universally sacred, 
and hence could not be killed or injured under 
any circumstances. Such were the cat, sacred to 
Bast or Sekhet; the ibis and cynocephalus ape, 
sacred to Thoth; the hawk and beetle, sacred to 




DOCTRIXES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 291 

Ra; and white cows, sacred to Hathor. It were 
a blacker crime to kill one of these than to kill a 
man. . Less universally revered were sheep, 
sacred to Kneph ; and dogs, which seem to have 
been sacred to no particular deity. Many ani- 
mals received but a local recognition. Lions 
were sacred to Iloros and Turn at Heliopolis and 
Leontopolis ; crocodiles were sacred to Set at 
Ombos, Coptos, and in the Fayoum ; hippopotami 
were sacred to Taouris at Papremis; wolves or 
jackals were sacred to Anubis at Lycopolis; 
ibexes and frogs at Thebes, antelopes at Coptos, 
goats at Mendes, ichneumons at Heracleopolis, 
and shrew-mice at Athribis. Vultures were sacred 
to Maut at Eileithyia, snakes at Thebes, and fish 
in various places. * 

" In each locality wdiere any kind of animal 
was sacred, some individuals of the species w^ere 
attached to the principal temples, where they had 
their special shrines or chambers, and their train 
of priestly attendants, who carefully fed them, 
cleaned them, and saw generally to their health 
and comfort. When any of them died, they were 
embalmed according to the most approved method, 
and deposited in mummy-pits, or in tombs specially 
appropriated to them, with much pomp and cere- 
mony. All the other individuals of the species 
were sacred within the locality, and had to be 



292 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

protected from injury. It was a capital offense 
to kill one of them intentionally ; and to do so 
even accidentally entailed some punishment or 
other, and necessitated priestly absolution. The 
different towns and districts were jealous for the 
honor of their favorites ; and quarrels occasion- 
ally broke out between city and city, or between 
province and province, in connection with their 
sacred animals, Avhich led in some cases to vio- 
lent and prolonged conflicts, in others to a 
smoldering but permanent hostility."* 

Sometimes the god was thought to come and 
enter a particular animal, Avhich was then in- 
stalled with great ceremony in its temple, and 
worshiped as the veritable incarnate god. Cer- 
tain marks on the animal were recognized by the 
priests as signs of the divine presence. The 
sacred bull called Apis was worshiped in a mag- 
nificent temple at Memphis. Here he was sump- 
tuously fed, numerously attended, grandly housed, 
devotedly worshiped, and from time to time led 
in procession through the streets, to receive, amid 
loud acclaim, the enthusiastic welcome of the in- 
habitants. Upon his death he was richly em- 
balmed, and deposited with great ceremony in 
the sepulchral chambers of the Serapeum. He 
became, after his death, the object of a special 

*Rawlinson, History of Ancieut Egypt, Vol. I, p. 425. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 293 

cult. All Egypt mourned, and would not be 
comforted until a successor had been installed 
in his place. There were similar incarnations at 
Heliopolis, Hermonthis, and Momemphis. 

The worship of animals was not peculiar to 
Egypt, though in that country it attained its 
most extensive development. Cows and oxen 
were worshiped among the Romans as they are 
in the present day among the Hindoos. The 
horse was sacred among the Celts, Germans, and 
Slavonians, and a number were kept at their 
temples. Horses and chariots of the sun were 
kept in the temple of Jerusalem, and four white 
Nissean studs of the Persians were sacred.* 
The Germans preserved cats because they were 
thought to be skilled in magic. They also made 
offerings to wild birds to induce them to spare 
the produce of the fields. 

In Holland, in early times, sacred swans were 
kept at the expense of the State, and the pun- 
ishment for killing one of these was death. At 
the Hague and elsewhere there was great rev- 
erence for the stork. The geese of the capital 
of Rome were sacred symbols of fruitfulness and 
domesticity kept in honor of Juno. 

These considerations, though not to be neg- 



*2 Kings xxiii, 11; Herodotus, I, 189; cf. Xenophon, Cyro- 
ptedia, VIII, 3, 12. 



294 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

lected in the solution of the problem, do not give 
an account of the origin of animal worship which 
is entirely satisfactory. They help to explain 
its development and perpetuation. It is more 
than probable that its beginnings belong to the 
most primitive society and are connected with 
Totemism. The argument in favor of this solu- 
tion h;is been urged with convincing power, but 
we can not in this connection enter upon its 
elaboration.* 

The deification of the kings was equally char- 
acteristic of the Egyptian religion, and 3'ields to 
a similar explanation. This dates from the time 
of the Old Kingdom. It seems to have been 
inaugurated by Chufu and Chafra of the fourth 
dynasty, though some of their predecessors 
were worshiped as gods ; whether during their 
lives or only after death can not be determined. 
Chufu was worshiped as a god under one of 
his immediate successors, and Psamtik, son of 
Uthahor, in the twenty-sixth dynasty was his 
priest. The sacred rites of the dead had been 
performed in his memory for two thousand 3 ears. 
The sons of Chafra were the priests of their own 
father. The same may be said of many other 



•■■ Consult J. G. Frazier, Totemism ; and W. Robertson Smith, 
Kinship and Marriage in early Arabia; and The Religion of 
the Semites, Fundamental Institutions. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 295 

kings. S.anctuaries were erected in which while 
living they were worshiped as gods, and special 
sepulchral temples were built beside their pyra- 
mids. This worship came to overshadow the 
worship of the gods. The king was the son of 
his god, the incarnation of the divine being on 
earth. "As every good man at his death became 
Osiris, as every one in danger or need could by 
the use of magic sentences assume the form of 
a deity, it is quite comprehensible how the king, 
not only after death, but already during his life, 
was placed on a level with the deity."* This 
doctrine was as pleasing to the people as to the 
king. 

Religion and the State among the Egyptians 
were completely identified. God himself was 
the ruler, and the king was his son. The tem- 
ples were but houses of prayer for the king, 
which none but him and the consecrated priests 
could enter. Priestly officers were State func- 
tionaries, and were generally under the appoint- 
ment of the king. The priests had shaven heads, 
wore white linen clothing, observed special 
cleanliness, ;ind abstained from certain kinds of 
food, especially from fish and beans. 

The belief in the immortality of the soul was 
strong among the Egyptians. The tomb was 

*Tiele, Egyptian Religion, p. 105. 



296 



FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 



called, literally, "the eternal dwelling." The de- 
parted are called "living;" the sarcophagus is 
" the lord of life ;" and the coffin is " the chest 
of the living." Only evil spirits are spoken of 
as "dead." An image of the god Osiris, repre- 




ROCK TOMBS ON THE NILE. 



senting the deceased and placed in his tomb, 
carries a hoe and pick and a bng of wheat, indi- 
cating thnt the departed is engaged in some use 
ful employment, and is united, in heart ;it least, 
to Osiris. Sacrifices and incense were offered 
in the tomb, over the lintel of which, and often 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 297 

in the chamber, wns an inscription in which we 
sometimes meet with em Jiotep — "in peace" — so 
frequent in Jewish and Christian sepulchral in- 
scriptions. Great attention was paid to the rites 
due to the dead, and the preservation of their 
tombs. The pyramids are monuments of the 
desire of the Egyptians to perpetuate the names 
and deeds of the departed, and by so doing to 
gain for themselves the favor of the gods. 

Inscriptions upon tombs were carefully pre- 
served, and a curse was pronounced upon him 
who w^ould remove them, or fail in performing 
the rites appointed to the dead. Not to have a 
son to celebrate these rites was accounted the 
greatest calamity. 

" The lustral water offered upon earth to the 
dead, had its counterpart in the other world. 
The most usual representation of this is the pic- 
ture in which the goddess Nut pours out the 
water of life to the deceased, from the interior of 
a' sycamore-tree," 

Sacrifices were not offered, it would appear, 
to the deceased himself, but to his ka. Now, 
concerning the nature of the ka, there has been 
great discussion. Brugsch explains it as "per- 
son," and with this explanation Dr. Birch agrees. 
Maspero and Renouf compare it with the Roman 
"genius." The latter says: "The Egyptian ka 



298 FIRE FROM STRAXGE ALTARS. 

was not a mere image ; it was conceived as en- 
dowed with life, intelligence, and will. . . . 
The Egyptians, moreover, believed that the un- 
seen world contained realities exactly correspond- 
ing to those of this life, and that among these 
realities each man had his prototype or living 
image, who seems to have sprung into existence 
at the same time with himself under the creative 
hand of Ptah, to have grown with his growth, 
and generally to have stood to him in a relation 
very much resembling that of the genius in the 
Roman mythology." According to Dr. Weide- 
mann, the ka is " the image which a man's name 
recalls to the mind's eye of those who have 
known him." "In countless representations sub- 
sequent to 1800 B. C, we see the king in the 
presence of the gods, while behind him stands 
his ka, shown as a little man with the ruler's 
own features. . . . Here the personality 
appears as companion to the person, doing what 
he does, and following him, as a man is followed 
by his shadow. . . . The separation between 
personality and person is not, however, thor- 
oughly and systematically carried out. They 
are undoubtedly two separate beings, but they 
are so far one that they can only exist through 
and with each other. Only so long as the ka 
is with him does the man live, and only at the 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 299 

moment of death does the ka leaA'e him. But 
herein we perceive a difference in their mutual 
relationship. The ka can exist without the 
body, but not so the body without the lea. Yet 
the ka is not therefore a loftier and more spirit- 
ual being. It is to the full as material as the 
body itself, needing the sustenance of food and 
drink, and suffering from hunger and thirst 
when deprived thereof." Miss Amelia B. Ed- 
wards interprets /ca as meaning the "life" or the 
"vital principle," and thinks that this best suits 
the passages in which the word occurs and their 
accompanying illustrations. " We ourselves speak 
figuratively of the life as 'going out of the body' 
at the moment of death; but the Egyptians be- 
lieved, not only that it went out, but that it hence- 
forth led an independent existence. They saw 
that, while the man lived, he nourished his life 
(/. e., his ka) with the foods and drinks which he 
consumed; and they naturally concluded, from 
their concrete point of view, that the ka, on de- 
serting the body, neetled a continuance of the 
same support. . . . We at once understand 
liow it was that the disembodied ka became de- 
pendent upon the periodical renewal of food-offer- 
ings, and why, failing such, he perished. When 
he perished, the Mife' of the deceased became 
extinct, and extinction was the greatest of calam- 



300 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

ities. It annihilated the dead man's prospects 
of ultimate reunion with his ka — his 'life' — and 
it deprived him of immortality."* 

This ka entered the idol, image, or O-siiid 
deposited in the tomb. The disembodied soul 
was enswathed in a body of its own. The 
Egyptians gave a substantive existence not only 
to the body, soul, spirit or intelligence, and ka, 
but also to the name and shadow. 

The Egyptians believed in spiritual posses- 
sions, dreams, charms, and incantations. Some of 
their dreams remind us of those recorded in the 
Bible. They attested the truth of their utter- 
ances by oaths, to which they also resorted in 
legal investigations. They believed in special 
providences, and lucky and unlucky days; indeed, 
all the days in the year are marked in their 
calendar either as lucky or as unlucky. Signs 
and omens possessed great influence among all 
classes of people. They believed in angels and 
fates. The Hathors or Egyptian fates were fair 
and beneficent maidens. 

Caste among the ancient Egyptians, except 
the caste of trade, which is felt in most countries 



* Renouf, Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeol- 
ogy, Vol. YI, p. 501 ; Miss Edwards, The Academy, Jan. 5, 1889, 
No. 870, pp. 12-14. The reader should consult throughout this 
chapter, Renouf, The Religion of Ancient Egypt. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 301 

in some degree, was unknown. Polygamy was 
only allowed, but not indorsed. The use of the 
word harem in connection with the early religious 
history is misleading. 

Among the virtues enjoined in their code of 
morality were piety, charity, gentleness, self- 
command, chastity, benevolence, honesty, kind- 
ness, truthfulness, justice, righteousness, good- 
ness, sincerity, friendship, hospitality, sobriety, 
peaceableness, humility, and honor to parents. 
The wicked were doomed to a horrible fate called 
"the second death." 

The Egyptians show the very slightest ac- 
knowledgment of sin, as we understand sin, 
while they seemed to hold very extravagant 
notions as to their own virtues and purity of 
character. There are abundant self-righteous 
boasting and pharisaic self-complacency. One 
of their number says with satisfied pride : 

"I was not an idler, 

No listener to counsels of sloth; 

My name was not heard in the place of reproof; 

I relaxed not. When I was brought 

To this land, it was as though a god was in it."* 

Another boasts : " I shielded the weak against 
the strong, I protected him who honored me, and 
was to him his best portion. I did all good 

* Goodwin, Records of the Past, Vol. VI, p. 137. 



302 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

things for them when the time came to do them. 
I was pious towards my father, and did the will 
of my mother; kind-hearted towards my brethren. 
I made a good sarcophagus for one who had no 
coffin."* Still another proclaims: "I myself 
was just and true, without malice, having put 
god in his heart, and having been quick to 
discern his will. I reached the city of those 
who are in eternity. I have done good upon 
earth ; I have not been wicked ; I have npt ap- 
proved of any offense or iniquity. . . . Pure 
is my soul. ... I have not made myself 
master over the lowly ; I have done no harm to 
men who honored their gods. I have spent my 
life in the life of truth, until I have attained the 
age of veneration. . . My sincerity and 

my goodness were in the heart of my father and 
mother; my affection was in them. Never have 
I outraged it in my mode of action towards them 
from the beginning of the time of my youth. 
Though great, yet I have acted as if I had been 
a little one. I have not disabled any one 
worthier than myself. My mouth has always 
been opened to utter true things, not to foment 
qunrrels. I have repeated what I have heard 
just as it was told me."*!* 



*Eenouf, Records of the Past, Vol. X, p. 52. 
t Chabas, Records of the Past, Yo\. X, pp. 7-10. 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 303 

Since Egyptians prepared their own tombs, 
these eulogies may have been their honest judg- 
ments concerning their own characters. They are 
important, at least, as ideals of excellence. 

The religion was most imposing in its cere 
monials. The temples were numerous, great, and 
massive. There were many lofty columns, long 
courts and halls, 
mighty obelisks, gi- 
gantic colossi, en- 
chanting groves and 
lakes, and long ave- 
nues of sphinxes, 
strong and majestic 
in their repose. 
Rich paintings and 
sculptures met the 
eye, strains of music 
greeted the ear, and 
clouds of incense 

rose upon the air. columns at karnak. 

The temples were thronged with crowds of 
devoted worshipers. Endless processions went 
forth from their portals, and everywhere were 
pomp, splendor, and display. There were solemn 
chafits, earnest prayers, smoking victims, constant 
rounds of service, mysterious rites, annual, 
monthly, and other festivals, symbolic observ- 




304 FIRE FROM S T RANGE AL TA RS. 

ances, and my thologic survivals. Images of the 
gods were paraded through the streets, attendant 
priests were clad in gorgeous vestments, proces- 
sions floated on the sacred Nile, flowers breathed 
their fragrance on the air, banners w^aved proudly 
and gallantly in the breeze, sacred emblems 
spoke a mysterious language, and a great multi- 
tude of features were calculated to develop 
wonder, reverence, solemnity, and worship. 

The offerings were numerous — ^bread, flour, 
cakes of various kinds, oil, honey, fruits, wine, 
beer, incense, aromatic gums, sweet-scented 
woods, the produce of the palm, olive, and mul- 
berry, the lotus and the papyrus, bouquets of 
flowers, baskets and garlands woven from flowers, 
gold, silver, brass, lapis lazuli, rings, divers 
vessels of silver and gold, garments, embroideries, 
natron, alabaster, jasper, carnelian, turquoise, salt, 
feldspar, hsematite, and all beautiful and precious 
stones; statues of gods, signets, necklaces, and all 
articles of adornment. The animals for sacrifices 
were bulls, oxen, cows and heifers, male calves, 
sheep, goats, pigs, geese, ducks, pigeons, antelopes 
and other wild animals and water-fowls. Oxen, 
male calves, and geese were universal victims ; 
others were for special occasions or places. The 
victim chosen to be sacrificed was usually decked 
with flowers and presented to the priest, who, 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WOltSHlP. • 305 

after thorough examination, pronounced as to its 
perfection. When slain, the blood was permitted 
to run over the altar. Parts of the victim were 
burned, while the remainder was shared between 
the priests and those who brought the victim. 
Sometimes the whole victim was consumed upon 
the altar. There were certain practices which 
remind us of the scape-goat of the Hebrew 
religion. There seemed also to have been some 
idea of the expiatory nature of sacrifice. 

" The larger temple-buildings were usually 
placed within a walled-in space, which inclosed 
the propylsea, formed of sphinxes couchanf, the 
sacred trees, and the fish-ponds. It was on these 
ponds that the mysteries of the journeys and 
conflicts of the gods on the heavenly ocean were 
acted, and they no doubt also served for the 
manifold lustrations. After entering the pre- 
cincts, and passing through between the rows of 
sphinxes, a second portal was reached, flanked 
by gigantic pylons or side towers, upon which, 
in most cases, might be found sculptured and 
painted great feats of war or religious represen- 
tations. Obelisks, gilt needles of stone, the sym- 
bolism of which belongs to solar worship, were 
very commonly found erected on opposite sides 
of this entrance, or further within the building; 
and statues of the kings were similarly placed. 



306 • FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTAR'S. 

"On festal occasions, gay streamers floated 
from high masts, that overtopped even the pil- 
lars. A lofty portal led next into a wide fore- 
court, open to the sky, but surrounded by a 
pillared corridor on three or four sides. After 
passing through one or more of these fore-courts, 
a lesser inclosure was reached, the roof of which, 
higher in the middle than at the sides, Avas sup- 
ported by pillars. This seems to have been a 
sort of fore-court for the priests; for immediately 
adjoining it was the holy of holies, which, on 
three sides, was surrounded by lesser halls and 
apartments, each one being set apart for some 
particular rite. Offerings of incense were pre- 
sented on the left, substantial offerings on the 
right. The holy of holies was low, small, and 
mysterious. There stood the sacred ark, the 
emblem of the hidden deity. This was a sort of 
chest, half-covered over by a veil or curtain, and, 
like the sacred boat upon which it was placed, 
it was Jidorned with the symbols of life, endur- 
ance, light, and fertilizing power. It ought ap- 
parently to be distinguished from the mystical 
chest, yet in many respects its significatio'n is the 
same; and, on days of festival, it was carried 
round in procession outside the temple by a 
number of the priests. Often, winged figures are 
found upon it, recalling the cherubim of the 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 307 

Israelitish temple. Within the ark was the im- 
age of the deity, which no pne had ever beheld, 
though other images of the gods were conspic- 
uous in the temples, and were also carried round 
in processions. Processional A'-oyages were often 
made on the river with the ark. 

"Each Egyptian would seem to have had his 
own particular chapel, where he performed his 
religious duties. The temples themselves could 
be entered onl}^ by the kings and priests, but the 
fore-courts were probably open to the people. 
On all sides the walls were eloquent, covered as 
they were with images and hieroglyphs. Every- 
thing was arranged with the greatest splendor 
and expense, but everywhere there was a feeling 
of mystery, of impressiveness, of seriousness. 
The temples of Egypt were grand and awe-in- 
spiring, rather than pleasant and alluring, like 
those of Greece. They were built on a colossal 
scale, their style was severe, and light was spar- 
ingly admitted. In one word, they were in per- 
fect keeping with the principal idea of the re- 
ligion practiced within them, and expressed, above 
all, the notions of durability, eternity, and the 
sacred mystery of the gods."* 

We do not find, however, that Moses borrowed 

*Tiele, Egyptian Religion, pp. 114-116. 



308 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

from the Egyptians. Renouf says : " I have read 
through a number of works professing to discover 
Egyptian influences in Hebrew institutions, but 
have not even found anything worth controvert- 
ing." External resemblances are abundant, but 
no transmission of ideas can be discovered. Is- 
raelitish idolatries can not, with any degree of 
certainty, be traced to Egypt. 

Hellenic religion and philosophy, according to 
the same author, are barren of Egyptian influ- 
ence. Contrary to the general opinion which has, 
till late years, been held, Renouf holds that Alex- 
andria was not the means of communicating Ori- 
ental and Egyptian ideas to the Western world. 
Indeed, down to Roman times, Alexandria was 
not directly connected with the East. The relig- 
ion of Egypt, so far as the evidence at hand en- 
ables us to form a judgment, was of native 
growth and original development. In its purity, 
it taught virtue, holiness, immortality, and future 
retributions. The sum of duty, as given in the 
Book of the Breaths of Life, is: "He hath given 
food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, clothes 
to the naked. He hath given the sacred food 
to the gods, the funeral repasts to the pure 
spirits. No complaint hath been made against 
him before any of the gods. . . . He is 
favored among the faithful, and divinized among 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 309 

the perfected. Let him live ! Let his soul 
live ! His soul is received wherever it willeth." * 

But this religion — pure in its moral precepts, 
profound in its mysteries — after having emerged 
from polytheism into the dawn of monotheism, 
not only fell short, but plunged again into a 
more degenerate polytheism and pantheism, even 
verging dangerously upon the grossest ma- 
terialism. 

The fires which burned upon these strange 
altars for so many centuries with varying bright- 
ness have long since gone out, and left but a 
deeper darkness. The altars themselves have 
crumbled into dust. There is no bleeding sacri- 
fice, no chanting priest with splendid vestments, 
no voice of prayer, no imposing service in temple 
or on high place, no procession solemn or joyous 
or orgiastic, no uplifted standard or waving 
banner, and no initiations into strange mysteries. 
The names of many of the gods, once feared or 
reverenced or loved, have been forgotten. Not a 
single worshiper remains ; no heart in all this 
world beats in loyalty to Bel, Baal, or Osiris. 
There, indeed, remain a few survivals of these 
ancient cults ; but they are lifeless and meaning- 
less, except as they throw a few rays of light 
back upon the far-distant past. 

* Horrack, Records of the Past, Vol. IV, pp. 127, 128. 



310 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

There is sufficient reason for the overthrow 
of these religions. They never emancipated 
themselves from a false philosophical basis. The 
universe, with all its gods, daemons, and men, was 
too frequently looked upon as an emanation, and 
not as a creation. Materialistic tendencies 
remained to the very last. Politics and religion, 
State and Church, were bound too closely together, 
or were united on an erroneous principle. The 
religions were local in origin and development. 
They were connected with certain places and 
certain peoples. A world religion was unknown. 
If at limes the religions strove to rise above 
polytheism, they were soon taught their inherent 
weakness, and descended to the pantheistic and 
materialistic. There was little recognition of sin 
in the Bible sense. It was a misfortune or an 
accident ; it was the result of ignorance or a mis- 
take in religious performance. In spite of much 
teaching approximating the truth, fate and magic 
held sway. The tendency was downward, and 
toward the dust. These religions were good 
only within their own territory ; beyond this, 
any other religion was just as good. 

There were two notable efforts on a large 
scale at reformation — one in Egypt and one in 
Babylon. These reformations were attempted 
by kings, and, as a result in each case, the king 



DOCTRINES, TEMPLES, WORSHIP. 311 

lost his throne, and a new dynasty was founded 
which was loyal to the old established faith, or 
a foreign monarch inherited the regal throne. 
Khiienaten sought to restrict the worship of 
Egypt to one god, the god of the solar disk. 
Afterward, pressed by necessity, he admitted the 
god Amon to equal honors. By this concession 
he hoped to save his crumbling throne. But it 
was too late. His zeal for a purer religion cost 
him the kingdom. Nabonidus sought to cen- 
tralize the worship of the gods of Babylonia in 
the capital. It was a great innovation. The 
people fell away from their allegiance. They 
welcomed the king of Persia to the royal power 
of Babylon. These religions could not be 
reformed, and they failed in the reformation of 
the people. The true germ was not present, or 
its vitality had been destroyed. 

The religion of the ancient Hebrews could 
not have originated from any one or all of these 
religions. That there were many points of con- 
tact has been abundantly shown. Judaism was 
influenced by all, but presented many sharp con- 
trasts, which yield to no ordinary explanation. 
The religion of the Jews was entirely different in 
spirit, and in fact was something quite sui generis. 

The sacred books of the Israelites could not 
have been borrowed from these religions. There 



312 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

are not a few superficial resemblances to which 
frequent reference has been made in this work; 
but when the tone and the spirit are considered, 
we discover how impossible it is to admit any 
vital kinship. That the religion of the Israelites 
was a development, and that this development 
moved on side by side with that of the other 
religions which we have passed under review, 
need not be denied ; but the religion of the Bible 
possessed a peculiar providential element. 

The man of Ur, "the friend of God," was 
divinely chosen and taught. His call to Canaan 
was unlike the call of Chedorlaomer, his great 
contemporary, to the same country. "It was 
God speaking in his soul that lifted him out of 
these polytheistic surroundings in Chaldsea, and 
gave him the lofty covenant of a pure faith in 
Canaan — a covenant which was for him and his 
descendants. It was not the thought of one who 
protested against the errors about him, but it 
was revealed to him by a voice from heaven ; a 
covenant was made and ratified between him 
and the Divine Speaker, which should never be 
forgotten."* The peculiarities of Hebrew char- 
acter which made this nation a fit depositary of 
the Word of God, and the peculiarities of the 
Hebrew language which made it a fit vehicle for 

* Jacob and Japheth, p. 58. 



DOCTRINES, TEAfPLES, WORSHIP. 313 

the reception and transmission of this Word, 
need not be discussed. Other and better qual- 
ified workers have thoroughly explored this 
fruitful field, and have presented on the subject 
many pieces of magnificent writing, which are 
familiar to the Bible student. The same divine 
spirit which was so conspicuous in the life of 
Abraham is to be seen throughout the Israelitish 
history. That spirit called the nation back again 
and again to the purity of its early faith, A 
long line of inspired prophets prevented a 
permanent fall into idolatry. Some of clear 
vision saw in the God of the Israelites a world- 
Grod, and caught more than a glimpse of a 
world-religion. 

Christianity is not a continuation of Judaism. 
It can not be considered an offshoot or a reformed 
type. It is not a new Judaism. The connection, 
however, between the two religions is very close. 
Judaism was a prophecy ; Christianity is its 
fulfillment. It saved all the divine elements- of 
Judaism, and wrought them into the imperishable 
religion of humanity. We can not review these 
old religions, which have engaged our attention 
in the present volume, without turning with an 
increasing confidence and affectionate humility to 
the impregnable rock of the Holy Scriptures. 
We can not call up the names of these thousand- 

27 



314 FIRE FROM STRANGE ALTARS. 

and-one old gods without lifting up our hearts 
in loving self-surrender to the God of heaven. 
We can not contemplate the tedious and labo- 
rious rites and the sometime frantic and frenzied 
appeals to attract the gods and secure peace, 
without joyfully bowing at the feet of Jesus the 
Christ, who sees the upward glance of the eye 
of faith, and hears the lowest whisper of prayer 
which rises from a sincere heart. 



4 



INDEX. 



A 115, 116 , became goddess, 112 ; old 
sun-god 112; wife of Samas. 112. 

A BD Had AD 190. 

Abed-Shemesh, 189. 

Abed-Susim 189. 

Abi-Baal, 172. 

Abraham. 17. 105, 312. 

Abu Hubba, 26, 28, 110. 

Abu Shahrein, 100, 101. 

Abydos, 249. 

AbzU: 154. 

•Academy," the, 300. 

Accad, 110. 

Accadian curse, 74-76. 

Aceadian language, 23 ; sacred, 63, 64 ; 
Semites composed in, 64; transla- 
tions from, 24, 64; no distinctions 
of gender, 62, 111. 

Accadian mother head of family. 111, 
112. 

Accadian religion — exorcists, 57 
gods origin of, 57; hymns 59-61 
performance becomes worship, 58 
stages of development, 56-58. 

Accadians 20; progress in science 
ana law, 29; Accadian traits, 120 

Accadian world-tree, 80, 81. 

Adam 96. 

Adar 36 71 ; character, 115, 116 ; con- 
sort. 116; mythical monarch. 116 

Adar-malkat. 116. 

Adonis, 133. 134 186 ; rites at Aphaca, 
186, 187 

Adrammelech, 116. 

.Eon. 151. 

^schylus, 134 

Agade, 23, 28, 110 ; library of, 22. 

Agathocles, 184. 

Agukak-rime, 67. 

Ahab, 177. 

Ala], 45 

Alexander Polyhistor, 98, 147. 

Allat, name of Nin-lil 97. 

Amar-agu, 67. 



Amelon, 22. 

Amenemha III, 264. 

Amenophis IV, attempts reformation, 
275-278. 

Amon, 195, 263, 266. 

Amon-Ra, god of great purity, 266; 
hymns, 268, 275; identified with 
Supreme God, 287. 

Amont, 266. 

Amrit, 199. 

An, 241. 

Ana, 56; chief deity of Erech, 95; 
worship extending West, 191. 

Anat, 95. 

Anathoth, 191. 

Anbar, 28, 110. 

Ancient Fragments, 99, 149, 150, 152, 
184, 185, 187, 197. 

"Ancient History of the East," 20, 94, 
198, 203, 204, 206, 207, 227. 

"Ancient Monarchies," 88, 119, 144. 

Animals— attached to temples, 291, 
292 ; embalmed, 291 ; origin of wor- 
ship, 294; sacred, 290-294; sacred 
among other nations, 294 ; worship 
of, 212, 213, 289-294. 

Animism, 57. 

Annunaki, 116. 

Aus, 150. 

"Anti-Nicene Library," 184. 

Antuf, dirge to, 237, 238. 

Ann, 78, 95 ; his sign, 95 ; worship ex- 
tending to the West, 191. 

Anubis, 256; god of mummies, 258, 
259 

Anuka, 264. 

Anxma, local god of Sippara, 112. 

Anunit, identified with Istar, 112. 

Apap, 247, 249. 

Apason, 149, 1.54. 

Apepi, 265, 266. 

Aphaca, 180, 186. 

Apis, 290 ; worship at Memphis, 292i 
293. 

315 



316 



INDEX. 



ApoUo, 176. 

ApoUodorus, 98. 

Apotheosis of men, 67. 

Apzu, 154. 

Aradus, 200. 

"Archseological Dictioiiarj-," 329, 

Ascalon, 179, 180. 

Ashdod, 187. 

Ashtar-Chemosh, 204. 

Ashtoreth, 131 ; character, 178-183. 

Aahtoreth-Karnaim, 178. 

Asnath, 241. 

Asnet, 241. 

Assorus, 143, 150. 

Assur, 142 ; emblem of, 144 ; lord of 
Assj'ria, 144 ; prayer to, 143, 144. 

Assurbauipal, 23, 38, 89, 90, 97, 128; 
helped by Istar, 141, 142. 

Assurnatsirpal, 144. 

Assyrian character, 91. 

Assyrian language, 18, 21 ; ancient in- 
terpolations in documents, 64. 

"Assyrian Lectures," 21. 

Assyrian, the oldest form of govern- 
ment, 28, 29. 

Assyrian Olympus, 83, 84. 

Assyrian religion — elemental wor- 
ship, 41; first triad of gods, 104: 
hymns, 105-108, 110, 111, 114, 115, 117, 
118, 120, 122, 129 ; human sacrifices, 
40; polytheism, 93, 94; ritual and 
rubric, 87, 88 ; sacrifices, 38, 39 ; si- 
rterial worship, 86, 87. 

Atargatis, 180. 

Ate, 74. 

Aten, 275. 

Athene, 194. 

Athens, 194. 

Attys- Adonis, 132 . 
Ansar, 143. 

Baad, 151, 155. 

Baal, 131, 256; character, 176, 178; 
high places, 176; his -svlfe Tanith, 
176 ; statue, 178. 

Baalim, 174. 

Baal-Tammuz, 176. 

Baba, 238. 

Babylon, 24, 25. 

Babylonia— first triad of gods, 104 ; li- 
braries, 24 ; number of gods, 144, 145. 

Baetyli, 179. 

Bahu, 104, 155. 



Balaam, 79, 185. 

Balak, 185. 

Balawat, 36. 

Bashan, 179. 

Bast, 262 ; called Pacht or Sechet, 280 ; 
festival, 279, 280 ; temple, 278-280. 

Bedad, 189. 

Beetle-god, 246, 247. 

"Beginnings of History," 55, 82, 150, 
164, 194. 

Bel, 130 ; represented, 97. 

Bela, 191, 192. 

Bel-Merodach, 130. 

Belus, 147-149. 

Beni Egibi, 25. 

Bennu-bird, symbol of immortality, 
243. 

Beor, 192. 

Berosus, 22, 23, 67, 98, 110, 146, 154, 188. 

Berytus, 172, 192, 195. 

Beth-Anath, 191. 

Beth-Dagon, 187. 

Beyrout, sepulcher at, 204. 

Bileam, 192. 

Birch, 214, 235, 239, 244, 297. 

Birs-i-Nimroud, 127. 

Black art, 41. 

Boeotia, 194 

" Book of the Breaths of Life," 308. 

" Book of the Dead," 217, 247, 255, 282 ; 
Egyptian judgment, 219-227; reve- 
lation of Thoth, 217 ; sacred use, 217, 
218: slow growth, 218. 

Borsippa, 24, 108, 128. 

Boscawen, 36, 38, 40, 85, 165. 

British Museum, 23, 214, 229, 230. 

Brugsch, 214, 277, 297. 

Bubastis, 262 ; temple, 278-280. 

Buru-Sin, 67. 

By bios, 134, 186 ; temple, 200. 

Cabalists, 46. 

Cabiri, 174, 175 ; character, 193, 194. 

Cadmus, 194. 

Calah, 108 ; library, 23. 

Canaanites, still in Palestine, 204, 205. 

Carteia, 195. 

Carthage, 176, 184, 190, 195; docu- 
ments, 40; human sacrifices, 184, 
206, 207. 

Casdim, 23. 

Caste, in Egypt, 300, 301. 

Cedar, used in magic, 81, 82. 



INDEX. 



317 



Chabas, 288, 302. 

Chafra, 294. 

Chaldcean Hercules, 115. 

"Chaldajaii Magic," 44-48. 

Chaldsean Noah, i2, 104. 

ChaldBean priests, 39; color of gar- 
ments, 87. 

Chambers, John David, 258. 

ChampoUion, 214. 

Chaos, 147-149 ; brood of, 67. 

Charms, 46, 91. 

Chem, character, 243, 244. 

Chemiiis, 263. 

Chemosh, 204. 

Chemosh-Ashtar, 175. 

Chepra, 246, 263. 

Children, sacrifice of to Baal, 184, 185. 

Chiun, 184. 

Chuum, god of the cataracts, 204. 

Chonsu, 267. 

Christianity, 313. 

Chufu, 294. 

Church and State, 310. 

"City of God," 55. 

Clay tablets, 21, 22. 

Coins of Tyre, 182, 183. 

Conder, 205. 

Cook, 234. 

Cooper, 129. 

Coptic language. 215 

Coptos, 263, 264. 

Corinth, 194. 

Cory, 99, 149, 150, 152, 184, 185, 188, 
197. 

Corybantes, 193. 

Cosmogonies, Babylonian, 146. 

Cossyra, 193. 

Creation— account of Abydenus, 150 ; 
Berosiis, 147-149; compared with 
Genesis, 149; Damascius, 149, 1.50; 
Sanchoniathon, 150*152; tablet from 
Ciitha, 152, 153. 

Creation tablets, 152-164. 

Creuzer, 205. 

Criminals, cast into furnace, 91. 

Crocodile, 264, 265. 

Cronos, 22. 

Curetes, 194. 

Curse, importance of, 74. 

Cutha, 152; library, 22; necropolis, 
121 ; tablet of the creation, 152, 153. 

Cybele, 179. 

Cyprus, 179, 189, 198. 



Cyropsedia, 293. 
Cythera, 179. 

Dache, 150. 

Dachus, 151. 

Dactyli, 193. 

Dad, 189. 

Dagon, 78, 187; meaning of the word, 
188. 

Dalas, 187. 

Damascius, 143, 154. 

Daniel, 65, 91. 

Darius, 244. 

Davke, 150. 

Davkina, 37,56,81, 101, 130; charac- 
ter, 103. 

Deifleation of Egyptian kings, 294, 295. 

Delbat, 130. 

Delitzsch, 28, 157, 165. 

Denderah, 214. 

Derceto, ISO. 

Deveria, 240. 

Dido, 190. 

"Die Keilenschriften und Das Alte 
Testament," 164, 165. 

Dilmun, 37, 126. 

Dirge, in memory of Mineptah, 234, 
235. 

Discoveries in Assyria, 17, 18. 

Diseases, caused by demons, 76 ; pun- 
ishments for sin, 76-79. 

Divination, 64-66. 

Divine name, 46. 

Dod, Dodo, 190 ; worshiped by North- 
ern Israelites, 190. 

Dollinger, 178, 182. 

Dumuzi, 103, 104. 

Dur-Sargina, 108. 

Ea, 37, 56, 70, 71, 83, 126; character, 
101-103; creates the human race 
and raises the dead, 101-103; signi 
fication of the name, 100 ; represen 
tation, 67. 

S-Babara, 109. 

"Ecclesiastical History," 187. 

Edwards, Miss, 299, 300. 

Efforts at Reformation in Egypt and 
Babylon, 310. 

" Egypt Exploration Fund," 240. 

Egyptian language, 213. 

Egyptian literature, 214-217; episto- 
lary correspondence, 240; magni- 



318 



INDEX. 



tude, 216, 217; poetry. 216, 236; 
romances, 240 ; style, 216. 

Egyptian poetry, 216, 236. 

Egyptian proverbs, 239, 240. 

"Egyptian Religion," 227, 247, 248, 
253, 260, 267, 289, 295, 307. 

Egyptian religion— animal worship, 
212, 213 ; attempted reforms, 267, 268, 
275-278 ; caste, 300, 301 ; ceremonies, 
303, 304; degenerate, 283; deifica- 
tion of kings, 294, 295 ; dreams, 300 ; 
gave little to Moses, 307, 308; gods 
local, 282 ; holy of holies, 306, 307 ; 
ideas concerning held by Greeks 
and Christians, 212, 218 ; illustration 
of its mythology, 284, 285 ; infirmi- 
ties of gods, 285 ; judgment, 219-227 ; 
lucky days, 300 ; monotheism, 
282- 284, 287 ; monotheism and poly- 
theism at the same time, 283 ; moral- 
ity in decline, 288 ; native and orig- 
inal, 308 ; number of gods, 282, 286, 
287 ; oaths, 300 ; offerings, 304, 305 ; 
pantheism, 287, 288 ; polygamy, 301 : 
processions, 303, 304; punishment 
of the wicked, 251; religion and 
state identified, 295; reward of the 
righteous, 254; sin. 301 ; sun, sym- 
bol of god, 282, 283; superstitions. 
300; temples described, 303, 305-307; 
virtues enjoined, 301, 302. 

Egyptian romances. 240. 

Egyptian sacrifices to the Ka, 235, 
236. 

Egyptian texts— destruction, 214, 215; 
preservation of papyri, 215, 216. 

Egyptian tombs— sepulchral cham- 
ber, 235. 

" Egypt under the Pharaohs," 277. 

Elagu, 126. 

Elam, 20, 90, 126. 

Elephantine, 264. 

Elijah, 177. 

Eliun, 174. 

Emesa, 179. 

Emu, 192. 

Enna, the poet, 230. 

Erebus, 151. 

Erech, 78, 90 ; library, 22. 

Eridu, 80, 82, 108, 119, 121, 130; a holy 
city, 101; worship, 97,98; its to- 
tem, 69. 

Eritu, 116. 



Eru, 116. 

Erua, 116. 

Esarhaddon, 89 ; helped bv Istar, 140, 
141. 

Esau, 191. 

Eshmun, 175, 192; name in com- 
pounds, 194. 

Esmunazar, 170, 194; sarcophagus. 
202, 203. 

Ethbaal, 177. 

Euphrates, 70, 83, 109. 

Eusebius, 147, 172. 

Evil eye, 45. 

Exorcists, 43, 57. 

Ezekiel, 66. 

E-Zida, temple of Nebo, 127. 

Fayoum, 264, 265. 

Fellahin, 204, 205. 

Fish-god, described by Berosus, 188; 
form, 187, 188. 

Fradenburgh, 40, 80, 119, 142, 170, 171. 

Frazier, 294. 

" Fresh Light from the Ancient Mon- 
uments," 198. 

" Friend of God, the," 312. 

■'From Under the Dust of Ages," 36, 
38, 40, 165. 

Future life, among the Chaldseans, 82. 

Gades, temple, 182, 183. 

Gasmu, 126. 

Gaulos, 195. 

Gaza, 187. 

Gebal, 134. 

Genea, 151. 

General Di Cesnola, 67. 

Genesis, 70, 82 ; compared with crea- 
tion tablets, 165, 166. 

Genos, 151. 

George the Syncellus, 147. 

Ghost world, 83. 

Gigim, 45. 

Ginsburg, 204. 

Gizdhubar, 22. 

God, in Egypt, 283, 284. 

Goddesses of Accadians equal to the 
gods in power, 111, 112. 

Gods and No-gods. 95 

" Gods of Our Fathers," 80, 119. 

Gods of the Phcenicians, 168. 

Gods— Semitic, representations, 67 : 
Assyrian, animal forms, 68. 



INDEX. 



319 



Goodwin, 230, 238, 275, 301. 
Gozo, 198. 
Gubara, 119. 
Gudua, 121, 192. 
Gula, 104. 

Had AD, 119, 189. 

Hades, 83, 84, 104, 192. 

Halevy, 85. 

Hamilear, sacrifices liuman victims, 

194. 
Hamiltonian method of teaching lan- 
guages, 23. 
Hammon, 195. 
Hanno, 194. 
Hapi, 265. 
Haran, 108. 
Harmachis, 244. 
Hathor, 257. 
Heathen religions, difficulties in the 

study, 211, 212. 
" Heidenthum und Judenthum," 178, 

182. 
Heliogabalus,179. 
Heliopolis, 132, 241. 
Henotheism, 285, 286. 
Hermes, 104. 

Hermes Trismegistus, 258. 
Herodotus, 23, 88, 127, 179, 180, 193-195, 

280; description of temple at Bu- 

bastis, 278-280 . of temple of Mero- 

dach at Babylon, 33, 34. 
Hesiod, 154. 
"Hibbert Lectures, 1887," 34, 37,40, 

53, 54, 58, 61, 74, 76, 79, 80, 82, 84, 98. 

100, 108, 109, 111, 115, 118, 120, 122, 

127, 129, 133, 142, 164, 187, 191. 
Hiram, tomb of, 200. 
■' History of Ancient Egypt," 216, 227, 

244, 254, 292. 
" History of Rome," 206. 
" History of the Jewish Church," 

178. 
Hittites, 265. 

Holy of holies, in Egypt, 306, 307. 
Homer, 134. 
Horace, 46, 194. 
Horemheb, 278. 
Hormuzd Rassam, 110. 
Horos, 238, 239; character, 256, 257; 

fights against Apap or Set, 257. 
Houghton, 31. 
Human sacrifices— Assyrian, 40; Car- 



thaginian, 184; Phoenician, 183-185, 
205-207, 

Hyksos, war against the Egyptian re- 
ligion, 265, 266, 

Hymns— Accadian, 59-61; from the 
" Book of the Dead," 247 ; relations 
to magical texts, 62, 63 ; to Amon- 
Ra, 268-275 ; to Matti gods, 117, 118 : 
to Merodach, 124, 125 ; to Nannar. 
105-108; to Nebo, 129; to Nergal, 
122; to Rimmon,120: to Samas, 110. 
Ill ; to the Nile, 230-237 : to the sun 
and sun-god, 114, 115, 229, 230. 

iDAEt, 193. 

Idpa, 45. 

minus, 150. 

Ilus, 151. 

Imhotep, 262. 

Im-Kharsag, 83. 

Immortality, Egyptian belief, 295, 

296. 
Incubus, 45. 
Innin, 45. 
Innina, 128. 
Isis, 256 ; lamentation, 261, 252 ; names 

and temples, 2,55. 
Isis and Nephthis, lamentation, 227, 

Israelites, fall into idolatry, 176, 
177. 

Istar, 97, 109, 130, 131 ; better side of 
her worship, 140 ; character of wor- 
ship, 131-133; descent into Hades, 
133-139; genealogy, 131 ; helps Esar- 
haddon and Assurbanipal, 140,141; 
representation, 141 ; war-goddess, 
140-142. 

Isun, 76, 78, 79. 

Itak, 76. 

" Jack and the Bean-stalk," 81. 

Jedidiah, 190. 

Jeremias, 66, 127. 

Jeroboam, 192, 

Jezebel, 119. 

Jezreel, 119, 

Joseph, 241. 

Josephus, 44. 

Joshua, 169. 

Judgment, Egyptian, 219-227, 

Jumjuma, 24. 

Justin Martyr, 44, 



320 



INDEX. 



Ka, 235,236: enters the Osirid, 300: 

meaning of, 297-300; sacrifices to. 

297, 298. 
Kaleh-Sherghat, 142. 
Karnak, columns at, 303. 
Kenrick, ISO, 183, 184, 186, 194, 195. 
Khaisag-Kurkura, 83. 
Khammuragas. 24, 67. 152. 
Khorsabad, 120. 
Kliuenaten— reformation of, 275-278- 

his monotheism, 311. 
Khusareth, 171. 
•Kinship and Marriage in Early 

Arabia," 294. 
Kirjath-Sepher, 171 
Ki-sar, 143 
Kissare, 143, 150. 
Kolpia, 151, 155. 
Komana, 132. 
Kudur-Nankhunte, 90. 
Kundi, 91. 

"La Divination," 66. 

Lake Tritonis, 195. 

Lakhama, 158. 

Lakhmu, 150. 

Lamas, 000. 

Lamentations of Isis and Neplitliis, 

227, 228, 251, 252. 
Lamma, 000. 

Language and literature, 211. 
Larsa, 109, library, 22, famous temple, 

109. 
Layard, 188. 

Laz, wife of Nergal, 122. 
Lebanon, 186. 
Lefebure, 239. 
Lehmann, 116. 
Lenormant, 20, 44-48, 55, 66, 82, 88, 94, 

113, 1.50, 164, 198, 203-207, 227. 
Lepsius, 214. 
Library — Calah, 23; Chaldaea, 22; 

Cutha, 22; Ereeh, 22; Larsa, 22 ; 

Nineveh, 23 ; Sippara, 110. 
Libyans, 280. 
Lil, 96. 
Lilith, 96. 

"Litany of Ra," 245, 246. 
Literature— its golden age in Egypt, 

266; of Babylonia, 21, 22. 
London Times, 26. 
Lucian, 132. 
Lugal-tudda, 72. 



Ma, 132, 247, 261. 

Uaabed, 199. 200. 

Mabog, 190. 

Magic, its home, 98. 

Magical texts, 62. 

Magic formulte, 49-53. 

Magic knots, 45. 

Makhir, 36. 

Malevolent mouth, 45. 

Malta, 198. 

Mamit, 74. 

Marad, 72 

Marathus, 199. 

Marseilles, tablet, 40, 170, 171, 197. 

Mas, 41. 

Maskim, 43. 

Maspero, 297. 

Matu, god of the tempest, 117, US. 

Melchizedek, 22, 174. 

Melkarth, 182,198. 

" Memoires du Congres Internationa) 
des Orientalistes," 187. 

Memphis, 241, 261. 

Mendes, 278. 

INIentu, 263. 

Meri, air-god, 118. 

Merodach, 70, 83 ; battle with Tiamat, 
157-162 ; character, 122-124 ; chooses 
Cyrus, 123 ; dogs of, 71 ; fights against 
the dragon of darkness, 124 ; hymns 
to, 124, 125 ; intercedes for Babylon. 
78 ; prayers to, 125, 126 ; raises the 
dead, 124 ; supreme god, 37 ; temple 
at Babylon, 32-38. 

Mesha, king of Moab, inscription, 170, 
204. 

Micah, 145. 

Mil com, 183. 

Min, 263. 

Minerva, 195. 

Moabite stone, 190, 204. 

Moloch, 183 ; form, 183 ; human sac- 
rifices, 183. 

Mommsen, 206. 

Moon-god, 104, 105 ; hymn to, 105-108 : 
prayer to, 108, 109 ; temple at Haran. 
108. 

Moses, did not borrow from Egypt. 
307, 308. 

Mot, 151. 

" Mountain of the World," 83, 84. 

Mountains, worship of, 85, 86. 

Movers, 205. 



INDEX. 



321 



Moymis, 150. 

Mugheir, 101, 104. 

Miiller. 175. 

Mul-lil, 56, 70, 77, 82, 83, 109, 130, 187; 

god of Nipur, 9C ; god of Semites, 

under name of Bel, 96, 97. 
Munt, 263. 
Mut, 266. 

Mummu-Tiamat, 156, 157. 
Mythology and magic in Egypt, 238, 

239. 

Kabonidus, 89, 108; attempts a re- 
ligious reformation, 123; prayer to 
Samas, 111. 

Name, sacred, 02. 

Namtar, 45, 79, 97, 137, 138. 

Nana, 128. 

Nanak, 104. 

Nan-gar, 37. 

Nannar, 104 ; hymn to, 105-108. 

Naram-Sin, 67. 

Naville, 246. 

Xebo, 34, 89 ; character, 127, 128 ; god 
of learning, 128-130 ; hymn to, 129 ; 
prayer to, 128 ; temple, 127, 128. 

Nebuchadnezzar, 32, 34, 39 ; high- 
priest to Merodach, 89 ; prayer to 
Merodach, 120 ; prayer to Nebo, 128, 
129 ; prayer to sun-god, 113 ; repairs 
temple at Sankereh, 113. 

Neith, 262; character, 280, 281 ; Wor- 
shiped by Libyans, 280. 

Nephthis, 256 ; lamentation for Osiris, 
252. 

Neptune, 194. 

Ner, 121, 192. 

Nergal, 155 ; character, 121, 122. 

Neriglissar, prayer to Merodach, 126. 

Nerra, 79, 121; god of Gudua, 192; 
messenger of vengeance, 77. 

Neubauer, 192. 

"Neuer Commentar tiber die Gene- 
Nightmare, 45. 

Nin, fish-god, 188. 

Nina, 128 ; serpent-goddess, 70. 

Nineveh, 128 ; contents of library, 24; 
organization of library, 23, 24. 

" Nineveh and Babylon," 188. 

Ninip, 115. 

Ninkigal, wife of Mul-lil, 97. 

Nin-lil, 97. 



Nin-lilli. 84. 

Nipur, 70, 108, 109, 130; entrance to 
Hades, 82; local god of, 90; wor- 
ship, 97, 98; totem, 71. 

Nisroch, 142. 

Noah, 27. 

Nonnus, 194. 

Nu, 257 ; character, 259, 260. 

" Nuada of the Silver Hand," 119. 

Nuzku, 130. 

Cannes, 98-100, 188. 

" Obser%-atiou of Bel," 86, 97. 

Odacon, 188. 

Offerings, Egyptian, 304, 305. 

Ombos, 255, 264. 

Omoroca, 147, 149, 155. 

On, religious cult of, 241. 

Onea, 194. 

Oppert, 113, 127, 144, 145, 203. 

" Oriental Records, Historical," 203. 

Orion, 253. 

Osiris— as Nile-god, 253 ; as sun-god, 
254; character, 253-255; figures 
placed in tombs, 296 ; has many 
names, 255; his worship, 254, 255;. 
myth by Plutarch, 250, 251 ; wor- 
ship in Phoenicia, 195 ; worship re- 
vived,, 278. 

Pacht, 280. 

Pantibiblia, 22, 110. 

Paphos, 179, 198. 

Pap-sukul, 137. 

Pa-ra, 241. 

Pentateuch, 40. 

Pessinus, 179. 

Phantom, 45. 

Philo of Alexandria, 212. 

Philo of Byblos, 150, 172. 

" Phoenicia," 180, 183, 184, 186, 194, 195. 

Phffiuician language, 170. 

Phoenician religion — character of the 
worship, 196-198, 205-207; circum- 
cision, 196, 197 ; coins, 172 ; difficul- 
ties in the study, 169, 170; gods 
represented, 196 ; idols, 204 ; mate- 
rial for the study, 169-172 ; open-air 
worship, 188, 189 ; Phoenicians a lit- 
erary people, 171 ; possible primi- 
tive monotheism, 172-175; sacrifi- 
cial victims, 197, 198 ; temple, 
198-200 ; tombs described, 200-203. 



322 



INDEX. 



Phrygia, 132. 

Picture writing, 19, 20. 

Plautus, 171. 

Plutarch, 250. 

" Poenulus," 171. 

Polias, 194. 

Polygamy, in Egj-pt, 301. 

Poseidon, 104. 

Possession by demons, 44. 

Pothos, 151. 

Prayers— Assyrian, 84, 85, 128, 129; 
Egyptian, to Aten, 276, 277. 

Priests — Assyrian, 32 ; dress and reve- 
nues, 38. 

Primitive Assyrian monotheism, 
93, 94. 

" Proceedings of the American Ori- 
ental Society," 28. 

Protogonus, 151. 

Proverbs, Egyptian, 239, 240. 

Ptah, god of Memphis, 261. 

Ptolemy Epiphanes, 214. 

Purifications, 45. 

Pyramids of Egypt, 297. 

QURNA, 214. 

Ra— battles with dark powers, 243; 

character, 241, 242; chief .deity of 

On, 241 ; myth of, 249. 
Rameses II, 205, 278. 
Rassam, discoveries of, 24, 26, 28, 36. 
Rawlinson, 88, 127, 144, 178, 182, 189, 

194, 196, 200, 203, 206, 210, 227, 244, 

254, 292. 
" Records of the Past," 85, 88, 90, 104, 

113, 116, 124, 129, 142, 144, 145, 203, 

204. 230, 234, 235, 237, 238, 239, 244, 

246, 275, 301, 302. 
Rehoboam, 192. 
" Religion of the Ancient Egyptians," 

214, 227, 228, 300. 
"Religions of the Ancient World," 

178, 189, 196, 206. 
"Religion of the Semites. Funda- 
mental Institutions," 40, 175, 294. 
Renouf, 214, 227, 228, 283, 284, 297, 300, 

302, 308. 
Rhodes, 194. 
Rimmon, 118, 189 ; character, 118, 119 ; 

hjrmn to, 120 ; identified with Ha- 

dad, 119. 
" Rope of the great god," 128. 



Rosetta stone, 21.3, 214. 
Rouge, 214. 

Rude stone monuments, 179. 
Rule, 203. 

Sabbaths, 87, 88. 

Sahattu, 88. 

Sacrifices— Assyrian, 38, 39; Egyptian, 
at tombs, 29G-29S; human, 40; rep- 
tiles unclean, 40 ; to the A'a, 297, 298. 

Sadyk, 174, 175, 192. 

Sais, 262; the goddess Keith, 280, 
281. 

Sala, consort of Rimmon, 119. 

Salamanu, 191. 

Salas, 187. 

Sallimmanu, 190, 191. 

Samas, 109; ahsorbs local sun-god, 
111; character, 112, 113; hymn to, 
no. 111 ; prayer to. 111, 113. 

Samlah, 192. 

S.anchoniathon, 172, 184, 185. 

Sanduarri, 90, 91. 

Sankereh, 113; library, 22. 

Sargon I, 22, 110. 

Sarrabu, 192. 

Sati, 264. 

Saul, a sun-god, 191. 

Savul, 191; fire-god, 112; absorbed by 
Samas, 112. 

Sawul, 191. 

Sayce, 19, 21, 34, 37. 40, 53, 64, 68, 61, 
74, 76, 79, 80, 82, 84. 88, 98. 100, 108. 
109, 111, 115, 118, 120, 121, 127-129, 133, 
142, 145, 164, 187, 191, 198. 

Scarabseus, symbol of Ra, 243. 

Schrader, 164. 

"Science of Religion," 17,i. 

Scripture and the monuments, 92. 

Seb, 259. 

Sebak, 264, 265. 

Sechet, 262, 280. 

Selene, 148. 

Self-mutilation, 92. 

Semites, distinctions of gender in lan- 
guage, 112. 

Sennacherib, 24; extends religion, 89. 

Sepharvaim, 26, 27, 110. 

Sepher, 110. 

Serapeum, 292. 

Set, 252, 278 ; character, 255, 256 : god 
of Ombos, 255; god of the Hyksos, 
265, 266. 



INDEX, 



323 



Seti I, 278. 

Seven, sacred number, 45, 62. 

Severus, 182. 

Shalmaneser II, 145. 

Shamanism, 57. 

Shemesh, 109, 188. 

Shu, 238, 247-249; character, 248, 249. 

Shnites, 192. 

Sicily, 194. 

Sin, ]08. 

Sin— among the Egyptians, 301 ; in- 
herited, 92. 

Sinai, 108. 

Sippara, 24, 26, 109 ; different places, 
28; library, 22; totem, 71. 

Sirius, 253. 

Sitzu, 91. 

Smith, G., 113. 

Smith, W. Robertson, 40, 176, 294. 

Sodom, 79. 

Solomon— introduced heathen wor- 
ship, 183 ; original name, 190. 

" Song of the Harper," 236, 237. 

Sorcery, 48, 49. 

Sozomen, 187. 

"Speaker's Commentary," 176. 

Specter, 45. 

Spells, 48-53. 

Sphinx, 244, 257. 

Spirits— cause sickness, 44; fall in 
love with women, 55 ; good and bad 
in conflict, 54, 55 ; hierarchy, 41 ,■ 42 ; 
innumerable, 54 ; malevolent, 43, 44. 

Stern, 237. 

Stanley, 178. 

Storm-gods, 117, 118. 

" Story of Phoenicia," 178, 182, 200, 203. 

Strabo, 127, 142. 

" Studies on the Times of Abraham," 
94, 108, 209. 

Succoth-Benoth, 127. 

Succubus, 45. 

Sumerian language, 23. 

Sun-god, 109; hymns to, 114, 115; 
local, absorbed by Samas, 111 ; op- 
posed to evil demons, 114, 115. 

Sutech, god of the Hyksos, 265, 266. 

Taaut, 171. 
Tabnit, 203. 
Talbot, 104, 113. 
Talismans, 46, 47. 
Talmudists, 46. 



Tammuz, 81, 103, 104, 186; cult, 130; 

temple, 130. 
Tanis, 278. 
Tanith, 195, 196. 
Tasmit, wife of Nebo, 127. 
Taurus, 71. 
Tauthe, 149, 
Taylor, Sophia, 165. 
Tefnut, 238, 247 ; representation, 249 
Telal, 45. 
Telchines, 193. 
Tel-Ibrahim, 121. 
Temple— Egyptian, described, 305-307 : 

only entered by kings and priests, 

307. 
Temple mounds, 86. 
" Tent Lite in Palestine," 205. 
Tertullian, 185. 
Teumman, king of Elam, 141. 
Thalassa, 148. 
Thalatth, 148, 154. 
Thebes, 214, 263. 
Thera, 194. 

Thinis, 249 ; sanctuary, 250. 
Thoth, 171; character, 258; writes 

portions of the " Book of the Dead," 

217. 
Thotmes III, 95, 191, 275. 
Thuro, 171. 
Tiamat, 47, 124, 154, 155; demon of 

chaos, 157 ; mother of the gods, 156 ; 

slain by Merodach, 157-162. 
Tiele, 227, 247, 248, 253, 260, 267, 289, 

295, 307. 
Tiglath-Pileser I, 89. 
Tillili, 130. 
Tobit, 55. 

Tombs, Egyptian, 296, 297. 
Tomkins, 94, 108, 205. 
Totemism, 57, 69, 294. 
" Transactions of the Society of Bibli- 
cal Archseology," 26, 31, 300. 
Tree of life, 81, 82. 
Turn, 242, 244, 247 ; temple at On, 242, 

243. 
Turin papyrus, 218. 
Tutu, 40 

Typhon, 2.52; slays Osiris, 250, 251. 
Tyre, 198. 

Ur, 89, 101; priesthood, 108; seat of 

worship of the moon-god, 104. 
Urania, 186. 



324 



INDEX. 



Uras, 115. 

Ur-Bagas, first monarch of Babylonia, 

109. 
" Ur of the Chaldees," 105. 
Uruku, 45. 
Usertasen III, 264. 
Utica, 176. 
Utug, 45. 
Uz, 70. 

Vampirk, 45. 

Venus, 179. 

" Victoria Institute," transactions, 28. 

Voice, deification, 74. 

Ward, Doctor, 28, 110. 
Weidemann, 298. 
Whitehouse, 165. 



Winged disk, 93. 

"Witnesses from the Dust," 40, 142, 

170, 171. 
Wolfe Expedition, 28. 
Writing, Assyrian, 18-20. 

Xenophon, 293. 

Xisuthrus, the Chaldsean Noah, 22, 27. 

Zagmuku, 33. 
Zamama, 32. 

Zarpanit, 116, 119, 126; character, 120: 
prostitution at her shrine, 126, 127 
Zi, 54. 
Zibeon, 191. 
Zigarum, 155. 
Zikum, 80, 155. 
Zu, 72; stole fire from heaven, 72-74. 



■> WITNESSES FROM THE DUST; •:• 

.-. OR, .-. 

Tte Bibk Illustrated from tte Monuments. 



By Rev. J. N. FRADENBURGH, Ph. D., D. D., 

Member of (he Society of Biblical Archeology of London, etc. 



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President of Allegheny College. 

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^ OLD HEROES: >■< 

THE HITTITES OF THE BIBLE. 



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